Cosmic Queries – Gravitons & Hyperspeed

What if we took Earth… and pushed it somewhere else? Neil deGrasse Tyson and Chuck Nice answer grab bag fan questions about gravitons, hyperspeed, saving the sun, and more!

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

• 0:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Chuck.

• 0:00Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 0:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Are people getting PhDs before they ask questions?

• 0:03Chuck Nice?

  I think they really are. Or they're trying to get us to do their graduate work on this show.

• 0:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or do their physics homework.

• 0:09Chuck Nice?

  Exactly.

• 0:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  One or the other is true. Coming up on StarTalk Cosmic Queries Grab Bag. Lot of physics in this edition.

• 0:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

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

• 0:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  StarTalk begins right now.

• 0:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is StarTalk. Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist. It's a Cosmic Queries Grab Bag. And you know what that means. Chuck Nice is right here.

• 0:42Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 0:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, Chuck.

• 0:45Chuck Nice?

  The fan favorite.

• 0:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a fan favorite.

• 0:47Chuck Nice?

  It is a fan favorite. The people love the Grab Bag.

• 0:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Why?

• 0:51Chuck Nice?

  You know?

• 0:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We have all these amazing guests and Nobel laureates.

• 0:53Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 0:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And they keep coming back for the Grab Bag.

• 0:55Chuck Nice?

  We like to grab them by the query.

• 1:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And Chuck, we still got Just Smart Enough sitting on our YouTube channel.

• 1:04Chuck Nice?

  That is correct, sir.

• 1:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That is a science, all-science comedy bit.

• 1:09Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, and it's, and guess what? Thank you, guys. Everybody's watching it, getting a lot of great feedback. It's my comedy special. It's on the StarTalk main YouTube channel.

• 1:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We love it.

• 1:17Chuck Nice?

  Please check it out.

• 1:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's pushing through a half a million views.

• 1:20Chuck Nice?

  Yes, it is.

• 1:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we're feeling good about it.

• 1:21Chuck Nice?

  Feeling good.

• 1:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right.

• 1:22Chuck Nice?

  So this is Sumit Sharma. And Sumit says, "While riding my bike, I noticed the dynamo that generates light every time I pedal. I think it converts rotational energy into electricity. In space, things stay in motion. What if we rotate a turbine that keeps rotating forever, generating loads of electricity that we can send back to Earth? Or have big solar fields? Why don't we generate electricity in this way?"

• 1:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Hmm, so two separate things.

• 1:58Chuck Nice?

  Two separate things.

• 1:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Three separate things. Let's start with the bicycle.

• 2:00Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 2:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I think what she's probably referring to is one of these devices that leans up against the wheel.

• 2:07Chuck Nice?

  No, that's a generator.

• 2:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, what's she talking about then?

• 2:09Chuck Nice?

  She's talking about you clip it onto your wheel and then when the wheel spins, it lights up.

• 2:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's all it does is light up?

• 2:15Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, but there's also the thing you're talking about, which is the same thing. You click it on and then it rotates a little wheel on the wheel and that turns a turbine.

• 2:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right.

• 2:24Chuck Nice?

  And that also creates electricity for a light.

• 2:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So let's go back to the middle 19th century.

• 2:30Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 2:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Michael Faraday.

• 2:31Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 2:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He might be the most important person many people have never heard of. Cause he invented a way to make electricity.

• 2:39Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 2:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. He saw a wire and he connected a wire to a little meter. The meter's not doing anything. Took the wire, passed it through a magnetic field.

• 2:50Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 2:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Didn't just have it sit there. He moved it and the wire went like that.

• 2:55Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, the meter went.

• 2:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He created current in the wire by passing it through a magnetic field. Okay, so, and that was an odd little toy that he made and he showed it around. So this is charming. What, you know?

• 3:10Chuck Nice?

  What a great little trick, Michael.

• 3:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, it's just a trick. And there's a rumored comment where, you know, someone like, was it the parliament? Whoever, this is in England, of what value is this to the British Empire?

• 3:24Chuck Nice?

  Indeed, sir. You are wasting our time, I see. And you expect us to use valuable pences and pounds?

• 3:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And chilings. Don't leave out the chilings. And so the reply rumored was, I don't know of what value this will be to the British Empire, but I know that one day you will tax it.

• 3:49Chuck Nice?

  Faraday was gangster. That is amazing.

• 3:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 3:54Chuck Nice?

  That is amazing. What a great statement.

• 3:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There's another, there's another statement in the same vein, and I don't know if he really said this, but it's attributed. Another one said, well, what value, what good is this? And he says, of what value to the world is a newborn baby?

• 4:11Chuck Nice?

  Well, you lose that argument because the value is nothing.

• 4:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, it's what I will it one day.

• 4:16Chuck Nice?

  One day be.

• 4:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, that's the whole point.

• 4:18Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 4:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's the exact analog.

• 4:20Chuck Nice?

  And that answer could still be nothing.

• 4:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And that is how all electricity is still made today.

• 4:24Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 4:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All electricity through motion.

• 4:27Chuck Nice?

  Through motion.

• 4:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 4:28Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 4:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So a turbine.

• 4:29Chuck Nice?

  It turns a turbine.

• 4:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Turbine.

• 4:30Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 4:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is wires passing through a magnetic field.

• 4:34Chuck Nice?

  And it creates electricity.

• 4:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct electricity every time.

• 4:36Chuck Nice?

  And I don't care where you are in the world. That's how you're getting the electricity.

• 4:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 4:40Chuck Nice?

  That's why windmills.

• 4:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wind, there's wind turbines, there's.

• 4:43Chuck Nice?

  Steam turbines.

• 4:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's the steam, that just creates something to spin.

• 4:46Chuck Nice?

  That's all it does is.

• 4:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  To go through it, that's what it is. And dams.

• 4:50Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 4:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Where they let the water go through.

• 4:52Chuck Nice?

  Yep.

• 4:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's turning.

• 4:53Chuck Nice?

  Turning a turbine. Even geothermal, they use the heat from the earth itself to heat water to make steam to turn a turbine. It's turbines all the way down, baby.

• 5:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, it's not turbines just to warm your home.

• 5:12Chuck Nice?

  No.

• 5:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because you can, you, you can do something with the geothermal.

• 5:15Chuck Nice?

  Well, you could warm your home with geothermal, nothing else.

• 5:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, but you're not generating electricity.

• 5:19Chuck Nice?

  You're not generating electricity to do so.

• 5:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right.

• 5:21Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 5:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so now, different from that, you have solar panels.

• 5:24Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 5:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Where the energy is already there.

• 5:27Chuck Nice?

  It's called the sun, baby.

• 5:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, you, you, you got it.

• 5:31Chuck Nice?

  It's a solar collector.

• 5:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You have your photovoltaic cells.

• 5:34Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 5:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And that converts the sunlight directly into electricity. And, and so, yeah, we can do that in space. China has a plan.

• 5:45Chuck Nice?

  To put a big ring and do exactly what Sumit is asking to do.

• 5:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't know if it's a ring, but they have, they're going to put up a solar farm in space.

• 5:53Chuck Nice?

  Well, that's, that's the second thing they're doing. So they have a ring that they're going to do.

• 5:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I didn't know about the ring.

• 5:57Chuck Nice?

  The ring is the latest thing that they're talking.

• 5:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You want to put a ring on it?

• 5:59Chuck Nice?

  They want to put a ring on it.

• 6:02Chuck Nice?

  That's why they put a ring on it.

• 6:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, when you're in space, if you're far enough out, then there is no nighttime.

• 6:10Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 6:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cause you're not making electricity with sunlight at night.

• 6:12Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 6:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And nor are you making electricity in daytime under clouds.

• 6:16Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 6:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There are no clouds and there's no nighttime if you're far enough out in space. You can always point something to the sun.

• 6:20Chuck Nice?

  24 hours a day.

• 6:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They would then convert it to microwaves, beam them back down to earth. To a place that will receive it. And it's free electricity.

• 6:28Chuck Nice?

  And here we are, talking about Drill Baby Drill.

• 6:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Still digging oil out of the ground.

• 6:32Chuck Nice?

  Still digging oil out of the ground and they are talking about putting solar arrays in space.

• 6:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And we like criticizing that, them, because they far and away are the largest coal.

• 6:44Chuck Nice?

  Coal burning.

• 6:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Coal burning country, okay? So it's easy to criticize that, putting a blind eye to what they're actually doing to get ready for the future.

• 6:53Chuck Nice?

  They have coal in China, but they still need more, okay? They don't have oil, so they need to import that. Guess what you can import? And you're gonna own it outright.

• 7:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The sun.

• 7:04Chuck Nice?

  The sun. And people are like, oh, solar power's not, it's not really viable. And I'm like, it's 93 million miles away and if you lay your ass on the beach, it will burn you. And you're gonna tell me that it's not. Anyway, I'm sorry.

• 7:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There's the evidence.

• 7:18Chuck Nice?

  There's the evidence that the sun.

• 7:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so there you have it.

• 7:21Chuck Nice?

  There you go, Sumit.

• 7:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, thank you for that.

• 7:23Chuck Nice?

  Way to go, Sumit.

• 7:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 7:24Chuck Nice?

  Way to get us thinking. All right, this is Sarun's.

• 7:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Don't make me come over there and read that for you. Don't make me.

• 7:32Chuck Nice?

  Sarun's.

• 7:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Don't make me grab this.

• 7:34Chuck Nice?

  I think it's Sarun's.

• 7:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, go.

• 7:35Chuck Nice?

  He says, "In sunshine, you said that if the sun were about to run out of fuel and collapse, any amount of atomic bombs wouldn't matter. But what if we could put giant rockets on Jupiter and throw it into the sun? Would that buy more life for the sun?"

• 7:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This guy is diabetic. He's Dr. Evil. He's Lex Luthor.

• 8:05Speaker 02

  I'm putting rockets on Jupiter.

• 8:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't know what he's remembering that I said, that maybe I said it wrong.

• 8:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What he's, what he's, what he's trying to talk about. Nuclear bomb, here's what I'm saying, here's what I'm saying, when the sun runs out of hydrogen in its core. Right. Then the furnace turns off. Right. To run out of it means at the place in the sun where it's hot enough to fuse hydrogen. They've run out of hydrogen. That's it. Okay. Right. All right. Hydrogen is everywhere else in the sun, is it not hot enough to fuse it? Exactly. If you could find a way to stir the contents of the sun, bring outer layers down into the middle. Right. Conveyor belt style, you could feed this nuclear engine with an essentially unlimited amount of hydrogen. Right.

• 8:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The amount of hydrogen participating in the sun's generation of energy, I forgot, is 1%? I mean, it's tiny compared to, the sun is made of hydrogen. Yes. 90% of the sun is 8% helium, 2% other. Okay, good, because I'm like, what? 2% other. I thought it was just, yeah, hydrogen and helium. Yeah, it's mostly hydrogen and helium, so that would be the way to prolong the life of the sun. In fact, there are star clusters in space, obviously, where they're all born at the same time, and so you expect them to evolve synchronously in a way that the high mass stars die first, the lower mass stars die second. There are some clusters where there's a star that should have died long ago and didn't. Ooh.

• 9:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's called a blue straggler. A blue straggler? Blue straggler.

• 9:43Speaker 02

  I remember when this first started.

• 9:47Speaker 02

  I'll never forget the time when the nursery was over here and all the stars came around.

• 9:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Hanging out longer than it should have in that diagram of the, of the cluster. Right. Okay? It was in my time in graduate school when people figured out what that was. You know what? What? A blue straggler is two stars that collided, stirring up their material. And giving each other new energy? New energy, that's right.

• 10:17Speaker 02

  So what I did was I found myself another star.

• 10:21Chuck Nice?

  I'm kinda like the Keith Richards of stars. Got a younger star over here that took his energy.

• 10:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How old is Keith Richards? He must be 120, 150.

• 10:33Chuck Nice?

  Oh, that's super cool.

• 10:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we know, we know the stirring up would work.

• 10:36Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 10:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cause these stars live longer than they're, than they're.

• 10:39Chuck Nice?

  Then they're supposed to.

• 10:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They're supposed to. So, but if you throw Jupiter in, that'll help a little, but Jupiter, as big as it is, is still small compared to the sun.

• 10:48Chuck Nice?

  Very.

• 10:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  By mass.

• 10:49Chuck Nice?

  By mass, right.

• 10:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So maybe we should just find another star system.

• 10:54Chuck Nice?

  That's it.

• 10:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're talking about five billion years in the future. If you can't have, figure a way to get another star.

• 10:59Chuck Nice?

  If we made it that far, by the way, if we do make it that far, let's just call it quits.

• 11:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're done.

• 11:06Chuck Nice?

  If we're here as a species five billion years from now, we need to be gone.

• 11:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Give the rats a chance.

• 11:12Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 11:27Speaker 03

  I'm Brian Futterman and I support StarTalk on Patreon. This is StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

• 11:43Chuck Nice?

  All right, here we go. This is David Everett, who says, "Artificial gravity in movies slash TV confuses me. When a starship gets hit by a torpedo, the crew tends to fly out of their seats. If artificial gravity is produced by the ship itself, shouldn't that not happen? And if it does happen, shouldn't the crew get splattered on the back wall when the ship goes into warp or hyperspace?"

• 12:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, two separate questions.

• 12:10Chuck Nice?

  To our.

• 12:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You get hit with a torpedo.

• 12:12Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 12:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So your artificial gravity is creating a, a force vector mimicking what happens on Earth. And that force vector is always down.

• 12:22Chuck Nice?

  Down.

• 12:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Down.

• 12:23Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 12:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Let me be precise. That force vector is always towards the center of the Earth.

• 12:27Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 12:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  For everyone experiencing that anywhere on Earth, it is down.

• 12:31Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 12:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 12:32Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 12:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Pete Holmes has a, has a gig where he's the comedian.

• 12:36Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, I know Pete.

• 12:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He talks about, um, well, wait a minute, if Earth is in space, then heaven is just away from Earth.

• 12:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No matter where you go. No matter where you are. So if you're on one side, you can say, I'm going to heaven. And point out, or go to heaven over there. Cause for someone on earth, that's up. That's up. Yeah. But anyhow, if I introduce any other force on you, you're gonna jolt from that. Right. You're gonna feel it. Same way you would on earth. You're gonna, exactly. Same way you would. Yeah. If you're on a bus and you, and you, and then the bus hits a wall or stops, you'll be jolted. Exactly. So in space, with your gravity vector doing its thing, if you get jolted, you'll get jolted. Okay. Now, we did an explainer on all the levels of acceleration, didn't we? Correct. Yeah. From, and I think we ended with splat.

• 13:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, it was, it was the, it was the jerk. The jerk. The, the, the, and we ended with snap, crackle and pop. Snap, crackle and pop. That's what it is. Dig that up. I'm gonna go over that again. It's all the levels of acceleration that can happen to you. Exactly. So now you wanna go to hyperspace. You need some sci-fi hocus pocus. Right. To not be splattered on the back wall. But not warp. You don't need high sci-fi hocus, sci-fi hocus pocus for warp because that is warping space. My bad. You are absolutely right. Okay. If you're gonna warp space. Right. That's, that's space doing the work for you. That's space doing the work for you. And you just step across. Right. You, you surf it. So that's not a problem. Right.

• 14:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So when they show it, the way to show it cool is the thing is there and it's, then it's off at a thing. Right. All right. That'll kill you. Right. Exactly. Everybody on that ship is dead.

• 14:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That'll kill you, I have. All right. Otherwise, you gotta find some other way to, to sort of Right. navigate the, the, the space-time continuum in ways that shorten your distance from where you are to the destination. Right. So, yeah, so genuine warp drives, if invoked properly, according to manufacturer specs, it should not be a pile of goo. Shouldn't be a pile of goo. Right. At the, at the end of the thing. Very good. There's a quick, if I can get morbid for a minute. Go ahead. There's a scene in the TV series Expanse. Oh, I love that. Where there's a, there's a sort of cowboy guy.

• 15:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He's okay. He's he's giving a cowboy showing off showing off his girlfriend.

• 15:12Chuck Nice?

  Oh, my God.

• 15:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Showing off his maneuver.

• 15:15Chuck Nice?

  Streaming.

• 15:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He's live streaming as he's in this craft and he's maneuvering and he's badass. Of course, he's strapped in. When you're in one of these things, you're in a five point harness, one between your legs, one on each side of your hip and one across each shoulder. You know what's not harnessed?

• 15:32Chuck Nice?

  Your head.

• 15:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. Okay, that's how Dale Earnhardt died.

• 15:37Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 15:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, he hit an embankment. His head is not restrained. The head keeps going.

• 15:43Chuck Nice?

  Snaps.

• 15:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  At 160 miles an hour.

• 15:45Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 15:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And the body stays there because it's strapped in.

• 15:47Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 15:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 15:48Chuck Nice?

  They're all chained in now.

• 15:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, they are. Yeah, they have a connection to the back.

• 15:52Chuck Nice?

  Connection to the tether.

• 15:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He had that option at the time.

• 15:55Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 15:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're old school.

• 15:56Chuck Nice?

  Old school for that.

• 15:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Old school, you're not gonna do it. So in this scene in the expanse, he goes through a membrane.

• 16:03Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Where the his spacecraft stops, it stopped at the membrane, but he doesn't.

• 16:10Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 16:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it's a pretty.

• 16:13Chuck Nice?

  It's pretty graphic.

• 16:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a pretty graphic.

• 16:14Chuck Nice?

  But it's kind of cool. Yeah. It's good physics.

• 16:19Chuck Nice?

  You learn physics.

• 16:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's accurate ass physics.

• 16:23Chuck Nice?

  That's accurate physics.

• 16:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And they would later say, here's why the craft didn't.

• 16:27Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Crumble because he was going really fast.

• 16:29Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 16:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And then stopped on an instant.

• 16:31Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 16:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  On a dime.

• 16:32Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 16:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right.

• 16:33Chuck Nice?

  Well, that's pretty cool. All right. Very cool. This is Dave Hartman. He says, hey, where's the gravity particle? Everything else has a particle of some sort. What's the deal with gravity?

• 16:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're looking for it. Okay. Give us a chance here.

• 16:50Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But the energy of the graviton is really low and we don't know how to go that low.

• 16:58Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 17:00Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 17:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's the problem.

• 17:01Chuck Nice?

  Because gravity is like a super weak force.

• 17:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It is the weakest force in the universe.

• 17:05Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 17:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know, you want evidence of that?

• 17:07Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 17:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Bend out and pick up a rock.

• 17:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, the entire earth. Was insufficient to prevent you from picking up the rock. Right. Think about that. Cause yeah, the gravity didn't change. Okay. That rock is on the ground because of gravity. Do you know what is forty two magnitudes? Powers of ten stronger than gravity? Electromagnetism. Oh, my God. Forty two powers of ten. That's incredible. Which is why you go to one of these magnet doors, you can't open it. Right. It's true. It's just two plates, you know? Or when you get electrocuted, they can't pry you from the wire. What, why, why'd you get dark? I'm sorry. I don't know what my problem is. No, but the, the doors that are magnetic, the doors that are magnetically locked. Yeah. And when you push a button. Yeah, and they unlock. It's an electromagnet. Right.

• 17:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And they just unlock. Yeah, you cannot open those doors. Okay, you know, maybe if you tried really hard, you risk breaking the door. Me, and that's just, that's just the circuitry in the thing itself. And you have all of Earth trying to hold on to the rock. And you swore it. And all you do is come by just like, look at you little girly earth.

• 18:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Girly earth. I pick up the rock so easily. Which become Arnold Schwarzenegger. All right. Here we go. So, so, yeah, we, we, we presume there's a graviton particle. Right. Corresponding to gravitational waves. Mm hmm. Just as there are, um, there's the photon as a particle. Uh, corresponding with waves of, waves of light. And the electron. Yes, okay. The electromagnetic. Right, so all of that combines. Yeah. So we're, we're looking for it. Yeah. Just, you know, chill. Get off our ass.

• 18:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Like I'm one of you.

• 18:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Like I have a, a stink in this game. I will find it soon. Like you got your own accelerator. My own accelerator, I mean, yeah. All right, here we go. Michael de la Morena. That's good. Uh huh. Shouldn't it be Miguel?

• 19:13Chuck Nice?

  Michael.

• 19:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Miguel. Don't tell a man what his name should be.

• 19:16Chuck Nice?

  All right. Is time a dimension or a field? It seems more like a field because it can be affected by gravity.

• 19:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know, I like that.

• 19:25Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 19:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I like the way.

• 19:28Chuck Nice?

  The way he's thinking of time.

• 19:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Miguel.

• 19:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I like that. I don't know that I have a good answer for that. The idea that gravity can distort time.

• 19:41Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 19:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In the way, you know, the way things interact in fundamental physics. There are fields that affect particles, particles that affect fields. And so, so that's an, that's an intriguing thought. And I might bring that up with.

• 19:59Chuck Nice?

  Brian Greene?

• 19:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  With Brian Greene.

• 20:00Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 20:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We have, we scheduled a session for him. Where we're gonna pick his brain for three hours.

• 20:04Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, it's gonna be a long session. I'm gonna smoke weed that day. All right.

• 20:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're gonna poke his, I don't know how much brain will be left by the time, but we're gonna get all in it.

• 20:15Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 20:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's an interesting concept.

• 20:17Chuck Nice?

  It's a really good concept.

• 20:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. And, but for now, we think of it as a dimension in which we are trapped in the present. And you know the rest of my quote there?

• 20:27Chuck Nice?

  Go ahead.

• 20:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We are prisoners of the present.

• 20:29Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 20:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Forever transitioning between our inaccessible past and our unknowable future.

• 20:36Chuck Nice?

  It's a really great quote. It's really good.

• 20:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just saying.

• 20:39Chuck Nice?

  That's good.

• 20:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're kinda stuck. But you're not stuck in space.

• 20:42Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 20:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You can move this way or this way.

• 20:44Chuck Nice?

  Move through space any way you want.

• 20:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jump up and down.

• 20:45Chuck Nice?

  Any way you want.

• 20:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, one day, if we can conquer time, we'll have access to our entire timeline.

• 20:51Chuck Nice?

  Right. I only wanna see parts of my timeline. I'm gonna tell you the truth. All right, this is Textile Wiz. He says, hypothetical Neil, you're given 40 yards of 0.15mm steel wire on a reel with no markings. Would you use it as fishing line or listen to the one minute message it may contain? How could you possibly know it contained information?

• 21:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Why would there be information in the wire? Why is that even a thought? Okay, by the way, if every part of the wire is identical to every other part, it cannot contain information.

• 21:29Chuck Nice?

  Why not?

• 21:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because information.

• 21:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is this configuration of whatever you have.

• 21:36Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 21:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is different from this configuration is different from that configuration. And the information is contained in the difference in these configurations.

• 21:44Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm.

• 21:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's where you get information.

• 21:46Chuck Nice?

  Information.

• 21:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If it's identical.

• 21:49Chuck Nice?

  Right. There can be no information because it's all the same all the way through.

• 21:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Same all the way through, or the only information is giving you is, is what's, what's the orientation of the, of the atoms that give you the string.

• 22:03Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 22:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. And often that, that repeats.

• 22:06Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 22:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  To be like.

• 22:07Chuck Nice?

  And it normally is.

• 22:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Like in a crystal.

• 22:09Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 22:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The, the patterns repeat.

• 22:10Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you only have information enough worthy of one of these patterns because once it repeats, it's not more information.

• 22:18Chuck Nice?

  Not more information. It's right. It's just repetition.

• 22:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Chuck, that's the difference between having two newspapers and two oranges.

• 22:24Chuck Nice?

  Uh huh.

• 22:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 22:26Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Two oranges, you got two oranges. Two newspapers, you don't have twice as much information.

• 22:32Chuck Nice?

  You just got two newspapers. But they got the same information.

• 22:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Information. Okay.

• 22:37Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. So I don't know how information would be embedded in the wire. And I have to know that in advance to even attempt that.

• 22:43Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But clearly that's what I would do if I had any suspicion.

• 22:46Chuck Nice?

  Suspicion. So the answer is go fishing.

• 22:51Chuck Nice?

  They right.

• 22:54Chuck Nice?

  No, that's not the answer.

• 22:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But it's a steel wire.

• 22:56Chuck Nice?

  It's a steel wire.

• 22:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's a big fish.

• 22:58Chuck Nice?

  I know what you're catching. We catching some tuna, some sailfish.

• 23:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What's the, what do you mean a sailfish and a sunfish?

• 23:04Chuck Nice?

  Oh, the sunfish are the big giant fish with the funny looking heads.

• 23:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What's the one with the thing?

• 23:09Chuck Nice?

  Sailfish.

• 23:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So what's the sunfish?

• 23:10Chuck Nice?

  The sunfish is the big, like fat, like it's just got a big fat, long head.

• 23:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 23:18Chuck Nice?

  That's the sunfish.

• 23:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just a city kid.

• 23:20Chuck Nice?

  And little teeny.

• 23:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 23:22Chuck Nice?

  Here we go. Steven R. Small says this, assuming spiral galaxies are evenly distributed. I'd predict an even split of spirals turning counterclockwise versus clockwise, plus a small fraction on edge where spin can't be detected.

• 23:42Chuck Nice?

  What would be learned if that prediction were true or not? Putting aside expansion of space. Is a galaxy's translational travel vector aligned with its equatorial plane like a frisbee?

• 23:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  For the longest time, people have wanting to use these massive data sets of galaxies in the universe to see if there's an orientation of the spiral galaxies.

• 24:06Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 24:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  One way or another.

• 24:07Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 24:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because they're gonna spin.

• 24:08Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, they could spin.

• 24:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That way.

• 24:10Chuck Nice?

  Right, and they could spin edge on, flat, all kinds.

• 24:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And who is this that asked the question?

• 24:15Chuck Nice?

  This is Stephen R. Small.

• 24:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Stephen presumes that if it's edge on, you wouldn't know which waves it's spinning, but we do.

• 24:21Chuck Nice?

  Oh.

• 24:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, you can put a slit across it and get its spectrum. And you'll see that one side of the galaxy is blue shifting towards you and the other side is red shifting away.

• 24:32Chuck Nice?

  That is brilliant.

• 24:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, this, yes, yes. My people are brilliant.

• 24:36Chuck Nice?

  I love that.

• 24:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  My people are brilliant.

• 24:39Chuck Nice?

  That is so cool, but go ahead.

• 24:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so you know if it's coming towards you.

• 24:42Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 24:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Even though it's edge on.

• 24:44Chuck Nice?

  Right, even though it's edge on.

• 24:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, okay.

• 24:45Chuck Nice?

  You can see what's blue shifting, what's red shifting.

• 24:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So another fact I must correct

• 24:50Chuck Nice?

  Uh huh.

• 24:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  is if you randomly scatter spiral galaxies into any, any environment.

• 24:56Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm.

• 24:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The most likely way you will find them is edge on. So if, if the, here's the dish, that's the galaxy.

• 25:03Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 25:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, here's a face on galaxy.

• 25:06Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm.

• 25:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So let's say the north pole is pointing to your, to your head. All right, that's also face on.

• 25:12Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 25:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The north pole is pointing that way.

• 25:15Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm.

• 25:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  To get a face on galaxy, the galaxy has to be facing you to be a face on galaxy.

• 25:21Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 25:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or it could be the other way.

• 25:24Chuck Nice?

  The other way.

• 25:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So there are only two ways.

• 25:26Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 25:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The pole can be pointing if you get a face on galaxy.

• 25:28Chuck Nice?

  Exactly.

• 25:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, edge on, oh my gosh.

• 25:32Chuck Nice?

  Oh, you can go all the way around the clock.

• 25:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  At edge on, the pole.

• 25:36Chuck Nice?

  Anywhere you want to go.

• 25:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Can be an entire circle.

• 25:38Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 25:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This way, and you are edge on the entire way. There are more ways to configure edge on galaxies than face on galaxies.

• 25:45Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 25:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In a random set of galaxies.

• 25:47Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely.

• 25:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, and you can show that probabilistically and statistically. And it's after, it's an exercise in graduate school, you do this. So don't be surprised when you look at the Hubble Deep Field and other things, there's a whole lot of edge on galaxies.

• 26:00Chuck Nice?

  Right, right.

• 26:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, people have been looking for extra rotating one way versus another, and.

• 26:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The first time someone made that claim, they had room full of people saying, which way is the galaxy rotating? Just they ignored the the Edjons. So which way is the galaxy rotating? And people made their catalog. They said, oh, my gosh. There's a net rotation clockwise. Holy cow, what's going on?

• 26:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And then people theorists started coming in, maybe there's leftover rotation from the Big Bang. And people started jumping all in. I call them ambulance chasing theorists. Okay?

• 26:39Chuck Nice?

  That's funny.

• 26:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. So then someone had the idea. Let's give this same test to a different set of people. Except have them look at the photos from the other side. The mirror image of the photo.

• 26:55Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 26:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They evaluated the thousands and thousands of galaxies. Once again, most of them are rotating clockwise.

• 27:03Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 27:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's not possible. I just flipped them all on you.

• 27:07Chuck Nice?

  Right, that's a mirror image.

• 27:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, so they concluded that there's a psychological preference for noticing.

• 27:15Chuck Nice?

  So we have a bias.

• 27:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We have a visual bias.

• 27:19Chuck Nice?

  We have a bias that allows us to look for that.

• 27:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's right. And so we said, we're not going to have humans doing this ever again.

• 27:24Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 27:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we trained computers, AI is coming in at the time.

• 27:27Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 27:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And someone now has a section of space. Not the whole, all sky. A section of space where there's a net angular momentum in what a net spin in one direction and not another. And that's in the last year or so.

• 27:41Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 27:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So check that out. And we we think it's not going to hold up. But it's nonetheless an observed result that people are contending with.

• 27:50Chuck Nice?

  Hmm.

• 27:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 27:51Chuck Nice?

  Well, Stephen, way to go, man.

• 27:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And we're using spiral galaxies because elliptical galaxies don't have the the stars are like

• 27:58Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, doing all kinds of crazy crap.

• 28:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, there's not really a

• 28:01Chuck Nice?

  Whereas the spiral galaxies are uniform.

• 28:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a uniform rotating system.

• 28:05Chuck Nice?

  Yeah. Which we, by the way, we're in one.

• 28:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're, we're, we're.

• 28:08Chuck Nice?

  There you go. This is, that's our way.

• 28:34Chuck Nice?

  Alright, this is Jose Ikamba. Jose Ikamba, Ikamba, who says-

• 28:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  By the way, is there an accent over the E?

• 28:43Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 28:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, cuz I knew a guy who took off the accent, he just wanted everybody to call him Joe.

• 28:47Chuck Nice?

  Josie.

• 28:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, just Joe's.

• 28:48Chuck Nice?

  Joe's.

• 28:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And that felt wrong.

• 28:50Chuck Nice?

  That's wrong.

• 28:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's what he wanted.

• 28:52Chuck Nice?

  Joe's.

• 28:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Joe's, okay.

• 28:54Chuck Nice?

  That sounds weird. He, uh, Jose says, "In Fantastic Four..."

• 28:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh.

• 28:59Chuck Nice?

  "First Steps."

• 29:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  "I remember the day that movie premiered, it was highly advertised, it looked intriguing, looked even fun." "Haven't seen it yet."

• 29:07Chuck Nice?

  Still haven't, me either. Um, he says, "Reed Richards considers teleporting Earth into another universe to save it. "Realistically, with current technology, what could humans do to move Earth from its orbit around the sun? "Analogous to dark or diomorphose or, but on a planetary scale, how plausible is it?"

• 29:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You gotta really understand how much mass there is on Earth.

• 29:35Chuck Nice?

  Tell me about it.

• 29:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, I did a calculation. Do you know they bench test rockets?

• 29:41Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 29:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Space rockets.

• 29:42Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 29:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In the desert.

• 29:43Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 29:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you know how they do that. They, they could point them upwards and see how far they go.

• 29:47Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 29:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But they don't. They anchor them to Earth.

• 29:50Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 29:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ignite them and measure all the forces and the pressures and the temperatures and everything. I thought to myself, if they kept doing that-

• 30:00Chuck Nice?

  We could increase the rotation of the Earth's speed.

• 30:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I said, "Are they slowing Earth that?" Because if it's perpendicular to our rotation, that would have a different effect, it wouldn't speed us up or slow us down. But if it's due east or due west?

• 30:12Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 30:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh my gosh. So I ran the calculation.

• 30:16Chuck Nice?

  Not gonna happen, huh?

• 30:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's not-

• 30:18Chuck Nice?

  It's not gonna happen.

• 30:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's not, it's nothing.

• 30:20Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 30:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Compared to the rotational inertia of the Earth. So-

• 30:25Chuck Nice?

  It's a mosquito punching an elephant.

• 30:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Not even.

• 30:27Chuck Nice?

  Not even that.

• 30:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a gnat.

• 30:30Chuck Nice?

  A blue whale.

• 30:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Give yourself bigger than an elephant.

• 30:34Chuck Nice?

  A gnat in a scuba gear, punching a blue whale.

• 30:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so it's not a thing. So, uh, but as I've said in other recordings we've made, there's a movie made in China-

• 30:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But with an international cast called Wandering Earth 2.

• 30:53Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 30:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I never saw Wandering Earth 1.

• 30:55Chuck Nice?

  I haven't seen either.

• 30:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, but Wandering Earth 2, there's something wrong with the sun. They gotta take Earth somewhere else. And there's no teleporting. It's kind of in present day, actually. But maybe a little bit in the future where they have space elevators and things. But it's not so far, it's not Star Trek future.

• 31:11Chuck Nice?

  No.

• 31:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. They got regular rockets. So they said, we gotta move Earth. And they set up these rockets around the perimeter of the Earth, all pointing the same way. And then they ignite them all. And then Earth slowly pulls out of orbit.

• 31:29Chuck Nice?

  Road trip.

• 31:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall to another star system to enter ourselves into their orbit.

• 31:38Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 31:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Now that, then you could choose where to put the orbit.

• 31:41Chuck Nice?

  That's true.

• 31:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Get the right exact temperature.

• 31:43Chuck Nice?

  Temperature, where everything you want.

• 31:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 31:46Chuck Nice?

  And wait, in the closest place we could go, which is not even a real star though, right? Isn't that Proxima?

• 31:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, Alpha Centauri is a system. Proxima Centauri is the closest star within the Alpha Centauri system.

• 31:58Chuck Nice?

  That's what I'm saying. So we would have to go to Proxima. We would have to go to Proxima because that's the closest we would.

• 32:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, for every star, there is a distance that would be the right Goldilocks distance.

• 32:07Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 32:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we can pick any star in principle and just go to the spot.

• 32:12Chuck Nice?

  That spot.

• 32:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 32:13Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 32:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yep.

• 32:14Chuck Nice?

  All right. So this is Tam Tam. Hey Tam Tam. In relational physics.

• 32:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Relation, this is very like psychotherapy.

• 32:24Chuck Nice?

  This is, yeah.

• 32:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What?

• 32:26Chuck Nice?

  In relational physics, you know? Tell me about EZMC squared. How's it make you feel?

• 32:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How's it feel? Makes me feel good, actually, okay.

• 32:36Chuck Nice?

  When different observers describe the same process differently, what is considered invariant? What actually holds across those perspectives?

• 32:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I like that.

• 32:47Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 32:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know what's invariant? That's a great point. Because two people seeing the same thing, interpreting it differently. Is there anything?

• 32:54Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 32:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's constant?

• 32:55Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 32:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, the speed of light.

• 32:56Chuck Nice?

  Ah, look at that.

• 32:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So no matter what's going on, if they measure the speed of light, they're gonna get the same answer.

• 33:02Chuck Nice?

  Oh, look at that.

• 33:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Now, there are other invariants. That's the simplest one I could describe. There's others where there's a combination of your light, your travel in time and your travel in space.

• 33:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so the length of that vector is the same for all the observers. If I'm remembering this correctly, I would check with Brian Greene again on this. But the combination of those two is invariant. So for me, my space vector might be longer than my time vector relative to you. You can have a longer time vector relative to space vector, but to connect the two ends, that length would be the same, and that would be the same throughout the system.

• 33:44Chuck Nice?

  Interesting.

• 33:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I think I'm getting that right.

• 33:46Chuck Nice?

  I got you.

• 33:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's been a while since I dug into it.

• 33:49Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 33:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But you see what I'm saying? And so just look at a triangle.

• 33:52Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 33:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And the hypotenuse of the triangle would be an invariant. But the triangle that gives you that hypotenuse can have varying to the legs can be a different size relative to each other. And these two legs, one is time and one is space.

• 34:06Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 34:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 34:07Chuck Nice?

  All right, now that's a very good way to explain it.

• 34:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 34:10Chuck Nice?

  Does that make sense?

• 34:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If that works out, yeah.

• 34:11Chuck Nice?

  Okay. Wow, Tamtam, like.

• 34:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's a good, deep question.

• 34:15Chuck Nice?

  And let me tell you what Tamtam's doing. She's like, can you do my physics homework?

• 34:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That is. And so invariance are the things that would be constant. And you want to know what those are because those are mathematical jump points from one observational system into another.

• 34:33Chuck Nice?

  Wow, look at these people.

• 34:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I know. We got some good people.

• 34:37Chuck Nice?

  I'm telling you, these people are.

• 34:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, we got like five minutes left. Give me maybe, do you think we could fit two in there?

• 34:41Chuck Nice?

  Diana Smith says, how can galaxies collide if everything is moving away?

• 34:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, I love that.

• 34:46Chuck Nice?

  More precisely, how is it that while the universe is expanding and moving away from us, the Milky Way and Andromeda will collide in the near future?

• 34:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, you ready for this?

• 34:55Chuck Nice?

  Uh huh.

• 34:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You ready?

• 34:55Chuck Nice?

  Go ahead.

• 34:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So galaxies that are near each other feel each other's gravity.

• 34:59Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 35:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And they have speeds in response to that gravity. All right, so I'm going to pick a number. Let's say 200 miles per second.

• 35:09Chuck Nice?

  All right.

• 35:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Let's just say, so that's a characteristic that goes much higher in galaxy clusters. Let's just say, pick a number, 200 miles per second. These galaxies feel each other and they're moving around each other. The universe is expanding. Well, the bigger is the distance between two objects, the faster it's expanding. If I'm not far away enough from this system for the expanding universe to be greater than 200 miles per second, the expanding universe will not manifest in this system.

• 35:43Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 35:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If I go far enough away so that the universe is expanding 400 miles per second, it's gonna rip these galaxies apart.

• 35:50Chuck Nice?

  Exactly.

• 35:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So galaxies nearby each other are not spread over enough space in the universe for the expansion of the universe to manifest.

• 36:00Chuck Nice?

  Oh, got you.

• 36:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  However.

• 36:02Chuck Nice?

  Uh oh.

• 36:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  However, in the big rip.

• 36:06Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 36:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The accelerating universe.

• 36:09Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 36:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There's a point where the expansion of the universe will rival the relative speeds of galaxies that are near one another, and it'll rip them apart. And then it'll rival the speeds within the scale of the galaxies themselves, it'll rip the stars apart. Then it'll rip the planets off the stars, then it'll rip the atoms out of the star, then it'll break the atoms apart, then it'll break the electrons off the atoms, then it'll break the nucleus apart.

• 36:36Chuck Nice?

  And that is because the acceleration is constantly increasing.

• 36:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Constantly increasing.

• 36:43Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 36:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it'll outstrip anything.

• 36:45Chuck Nice?

  It'll outstrip anything.

• 36:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Anything that would otherwise be holding itself together.

• 36:47Chuck Nice?

  You can outrun it.

• 36:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Can't outrun it.

• 36:48Chuck Nice?

  Can't outrun it.

• 36:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's a good way to say it.

• 36:49Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 36:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So that's why galaxies, only nearby galaxies will ever show a blue shift.

• 36:55Chuck Nice?

  Oh, look at that.

• 36:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 36:57Chuck Nice?

  That's very cool.

• 36:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 36:58Chuck Nice?

  Good stuff.

• 36:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's only when the red shift outmuscles it.

• 37:01Chuck Nice?

  That, right.

• 37:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so no faraway galaxy has a blue shift.

• 37:04Chuck Nice?

  Has a blue shift.

• 37:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Nope.

• 37:04Chuck Nice?

  Look at that.

• 37:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 37:05Chuck Nice?

  Wow, Diana Smith, these, these people are very smart.

• 37:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And we are on a collision course with Andromeda.

• 37:11Chuck Nice?

  Andromeda, right, because we're close enough.

• 37:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, in like 7 billion years, plus or minus.

• 37:14Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, so stick around, Diana.

• 37:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  October 3rd.

• 37:19Chuck Nice?

  All right. Bill says, "In the classic depiction of a supermassive black hole, e.g. interstellar, the accretion disk looks aligned flat horizontally from our point of view. Does a black hole look the same from all sides, left, right, top, bottom? Doesn't make a difference. And is it even possible to get behind a black hole?"

• 37:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so I'm impressed that he called that a classic description. Right. That's only been with us for like ten years or so. Right. Ever since we've had enough modeling, enough physics, enough theoretical understandings. So I'm impressed that that's now classic. That's classic now, that's funny. And it looked like you were coming in on the accretion disk. Mm-hmm. But there's distortions in the spacetime continuum in the vicinity of the black hole. So the accretion disk behind the black hole has sidelines that come around the black hole to you. Because it's bending the light around because the gravity is that deep and heavy. It's bending the light around. That's amazing. So you're seeing this sort of unfolded image of a black hole in all places. You see behind it when you're in front of it.

• 38:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You can't sneak up on a black hole.

• 38:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you can go behind the black hole. Right. But then I'm gonna see your ass in front of the black hole. That's right. Because the light travels to you. And when you see curved light, you don't know that it's curved. Right. As far as you're concerned, it's a straight line. Just like when you see the sunrise. Right. The sun isn't there. Yeah. The sun is five minutes below. Right. Because the light refracted, it's not for the same reasons, but I'm saying if the light bends and you see it, you don't see bent light. Right. You're seeing the light. You're seeing a straight line. Straight line. You're seeing it as a straight line. Because that's why you see it. That's why you see it. And it's the refraction of the atmosphere that five minutes later, the sun actually rises. But the atmosphere bent it into your view and you think it's in a straight line. Woo! So that's what's going on there. That's what's going on in the black hole.

• 39:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're seeing all sides of the thing. That's dope. Totally dope. That is amazing. I love it. I answered that quick, didn't I? Yeah, you did. Whoa. Yeah. Absolutely. I answered that quickly. Yes, you did. Thank you for doing that. My mom would be very upset. Your mama was a grammar Nazi. Yes, she was. Okay. Yeah, my house was a hell of a scene. That's why you're so well spoken. Oh, dear.

• 39:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know, one of my favorite shirts is? What's that? A librarian, I saw a librarian wearing it, okay? Right. Well, I don't know if she was a librarian, but she looked the part. Okay. I was at a book festival. Right. Or I'm signing books. Right. She's walking around. Right. Kind of middle-aged. She had a card catalog behind her. Card catalog. That was on the Dewey Decimal System. You know, she had the glasses with the, with the thing and the hair was in a bun. Right. Okay. Yeah. But she wore a t-shirt and librarians don't wear a t-shirt. Oh, alright. This t-shirt said, "I'm silently correcting your grammar." That's a cool t-shirt. That's, that's gangster right there. Right, that is. Right, right. Yeah. So Chuck, that's it, that's another. That was a great episode. Man. These, these people, they're, they're bringing it with the questions.

• 40:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Bring it in, bring it on, bring it in. Yeah. Another completed episode of Cosmic Aquarius Grab Bag Edition. Thanks again Chuck. Always a pleasure. For being here. Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist. Keep looking out.