Cosmic Queries – Cosmic Conundrums

Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck Nice answer fan-submitted Cosmic Queries on black holes, dark matter, the Higgs boson, extraterrestrial life in our solar system, higher dimensions, and much more!

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.

• 0:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  StarTalk. Neil deGrasse Tyson here, your personal astrophysicist. This is Cosmic Queries Edition.

• 0:22Chuck Nice?

  Ah.

• 0:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cosmic conundrums.

• 0:25Chuck Nice?

  Ooh.

• 0:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Would sound like we couldn't fit them together in the one category.

• 0:29Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 0:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we just put them all together.

• 0:32Chuck Nice?

  Better known as Hodgepodge.

• 0:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Hodgepodge. Chuck Nice in the house? We are in the Corona-verse.

• 0:37Chuck Nice?

  Yes, we are.

• 0:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright.

• 0:40Chuck Nice?

  Well, of course, we always have our different inquiries gleaned from all over the internet. And as usual, we start with-

• 0:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, wait, we're not bringing in another expert, so this means I have to know all the answers?

• 0:51Chuck Nice?

  Yes, you do.

• 0:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, fine.

• 0:53Chuck Nice?

  As like you don't anyway, so, but, um...

• 0:58Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, we always start with the Patreon patron because you guys give us money. Thank you. Thank you, by the way. Thank you for your money.

• 1:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Isn't there a nicer way to say that?

• 1:06Chuck Nice?

  No, I just like being direct like that.

• 1:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, fine.

• 1:08Chuck Nice?

  Because it sounds cool, you know? Thank you for your money, which is what I just want to say on every birthday.

• 1:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And allow me to say that we're using the money-

• 1:18Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 1:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  -to invent other incarnations of what it is we do.

• 1:23Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely.

• 1:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Which are all in themselves experiments that we test, you know, we battle test them, see if they work.

• 1:29Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 1:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Refine them, and that takes money that we're not otherwise getting from sponsors.

• 1:34Chuck Nice?

  No, exactly.

• 1:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's my point. It keeps us vibrant.

• 1:36Chuck Nice?

  It does.

• 1:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 1:37Chuck Nice?

  The Patreon people don't even know, there's stuff that we've done because of you.

• 1:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:41Chuck Nice?

  You know, which is cool. Alright, let's go to Stacy Brown, who's our first Patreon patron, and she says, "Dr. Tyson, if you were captain of the starship Enterprise..."

• 1:53Chuck Nice?

  Where would you go first and why? And of course, we have to suspend disbelief and say that Warp is real. So, traveling at this, beyond the speed of light is now a capability. So now that gives you the, uh, the option to leave this galaxy, go anywhere you want in the observable universe.

• 2:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I would stick in my own galaxy.

• 2:17Chuck Nice?

  Oh.

• 2:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because there's not enough we know about it, so let me just know my backyard first.

• 2:20Chuck Nice?

  Alrighty.

• 2:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, and then I, so I would take a tour around the galaxy.

• 2:25Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 2:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Around the hood.

• 2:26Chuck Nice?

  Around the, right.

• 2:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright.

• 2:28Chuck Nice?

  Once around the block, James.

• 2:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Once around the block. If, uh, left to the solar system's own motion, that takes about 200 million years for one trip.

• 2:38Chuck Nice?

  Cool.

• 2:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so, you know, that's still fast, given the scale of all of this. But, but the sun and all the planets and all the comets and all the asteroids, and everybody is all moving around the galaxy together.

• 2:51Chuck Nice?

  Nice.

• 2:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay? Now, there's something, something happened on the internet recently. Of course, of course, if we are going around the sun.

• 2:57Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 2:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And the entire system is orbiting the galaxy.

• 3:02Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 3:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It means we don't complete a closed orbit around the sun. All orbits are corkscrews.

• 3:09Chuck Nice?

  Right, because the galaxy is also moving.

• 3:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, the, the solar system is moving.

• 3:13Chuck Nice?

  Moving.

• 3:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, so if you followed the path. So, there was this, all this attention given to someone showing the video of this and saying, "Oh, this is a new theory of the solar system. Oh, my gosh, did, did, did the experts know this?" It's like, people, this is just two motions simultaneously.

• 3:32Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 3:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, if you do this, you go your orbit. If you go that way, it's a straight line.

• 3:36Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 3:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If you do this and that, you get a helix. Yeah, a corkscrew.

• 3:40Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 3:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, so.

• 3:41Chuck Nice?

  It's like when you drop a ball on a plane.

• 3:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, yeah.

• 3:44Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 3:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, it goes straight down to you. But if I'm watching you, the ball actually.

• 3:48Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 3:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Went forward at 500 miles an hour.

• 3:50Chuck Nice?

  Exactly, yeah.

• 3:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. But so did you.

• 3:52Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 3:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So it just went straight down to you.

• 3:55Chuck Nice?

  Exactly.

• 3:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, right, right.

• 3:56Chuck Nice?

  So that's cool.

• 3:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, wait, wait. So, I would do that, that's just to, but then I'd go straight to the center and observe the supermassive black hole dining upon stars that have come too close.

• 4:08Chuck Nice?

  Hmm, nice.

• 4:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's what I would do.

• 4:11Chuck Nice?

  Alright, gonna watch the galaxy have a snack. Okay, there you go, Stacy. Alright, let's go to another Patreon. Uh, Tony, Tony Mirabella. Wants to know this. That is a cool name.

• 4:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Tony Mirabella.

• 4:25Chuck Nice?

  He does sound like a Vegas act, right?

• 4:30Chuck Nice?

  That's kinda cool.

• 4:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Tonight only.

• 4:32Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 4:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Tony Mirabella.

• 4:33Chuck Nice?

  Welcome to the beautiful downtown Stardust Lounge here in Vegas. Ladies and gentlemen, it is my pleasure to bring to you the one, the only, Tony Mirabella.

• 4:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And he's singing before he comes out.

• 4:45Chuck Nice?

  Well, that talks.

• 4:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, you can't. He's singing offstage first and he comes on.

• 4:51Chuck Nice?

  Exactly. All right.

• 4:55Chuck Nice?

  That was so stupid. Okay, he says, what do you think unlocking the secrets of dark matter could do for us scientifically? Would it lead us to being able to harness it? Wow, those are two really big questions.

• 5:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How old is he? Is he some kid in a basement trying to?

• 5:16Chuck Nice?

  He's trying to figure something out.

• 5:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A future superhero nemesis in the making.

• 5:19Chuck Nice?

  He's making his own little universe or something. Can we harness this?

• 5:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We have no idea what dark matter is. The best, I have my own preferences, but my preferences don't matter. What matters is what experiments are active and in progress. And right now, the going thinking is that it is a category of particle that simply doesn't interact with us electromagnetically. So electromagnetism is like light and magnetism and all the things that make atoms stick together as molecules. So you are held together by electromagnetic forces.

• 5:58Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 5:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, that's why.

• 6:00Chuck Nice?

  And therapy twice a week.

• 6:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, I don't want that holding you together, but physically, yeah, emotionally is another thing.

• 6:06Chuck Nice?

  Oh, okay.

• 6:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, I don't know what's holding you together emotionally.

• 6:09Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 6:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Physically, you're held together by electromagnetic forces. This would be a category of particles that does not interact with our electromagnetic forces, which means they just pass right on through like you're not even there.

• 6:21Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 6:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But.

• 6:22Chuck Nice?

  So how do you observe something like that?

• 6:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Gravitationally. Okay, so we have a dark, we only know, the only reason why we know there's dark matter here is because, well, we have some galaxies, but add up all the matter in those galaxies, it doesn't account for what's going on in this part of the neighborhood. Because you see galaxies from behind, whose light gets lensed according to Einstein's general relativity. And you can ask, how much mass does it take, how much gravity does it take to lens by that amount? And you come up with a number way bigger than simply counting the, the, the galaxies that are there.

• 6:57Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 6:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Something else is happening. So, we call it dark matter. Because we don't know what else to call it.

• 7:04Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 7:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Like I said, I've said many times, it's really dark gravity.

• 7:08Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 7:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's literally dark gravity.

• 7:09Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 7:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We don't know if it's matter. The, the folks betting on it think it is matter, and there's a new kind of particle that we have yet to isolate. That's all.

• 7:18Chuck Nice?

  That is cool.

• 7:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, if we do isolate it, what would you do with it? Or you'll, you put it in your hand, no, it'll pass right through your hand, because it doesn't interact with your hand. Alright, so I don't know how you would contain it.

• 7:29Chuck Nice?

  How do you contain it?

• 7:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You would need a dark matter box.

• 7:31Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 7:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Who's gonna make the dark matter box? I mean, it's a philosophical problem.

• 7:37Chuck Nice?

  It really is.

• 7:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If, if there's a, if there's a thing that passes right through you.

• 7:42Chuck Nice?

  What, how do you contain the thing?

• 7:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The thing.

• 7:45Chuck Nice?

  That passes through everything.

• 7:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Everything.

• 7:47Chuck Nice?

  So, everything it passes through, you need to find something that can hold it.

• 7:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Thing to hold the thing in.

• 7:52Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 7:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct.

• 7:53Chuck Nice?

  There you go.

• 7:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You need something that interacts not only with our forces, but also with its forces.

• 7:58Chuck Nice?

  Exactly.

• 7:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That could be yet another frontier of discovery in the universe.

• 8:02Chuck Nice?

  What is that intermediary thing?

• 8:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In fact, if you were that civilization.

• 8:05Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 8:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You'd be badass. Oh my gosh. You control not only all the universe that we know about.

• 8:10Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 8:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But the rest of the universe that's influenced by dark matter. You'd be able to grab it, make dark matter planets out of it. If you can make it stick to itself.

• 8:18Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 8:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, yeah, that would be a powerful posture to purvey.

• 8:23Chuck Nice?

  Exactly. Alright, so now, take that and dark energy.

• 8:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is that also in the question?

• 8:31Chuck Nice?

  Oh no, that was.

• 8:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, it's not in the question. I answered Vegas Act.

• 8:34Chuck Nice?

  Okay, you, you answered Tony Mirabel's question. I'll move on.

• 8:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright.

• 8:37Chuck Nice?

  Maybe it'll come up in a different.

• 8:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Exactly.

• 8:39Chuck Nice?

  In a different question. You're like, don't push it, bro. Alright, here we go. Um, Eduardo Munoz from Facebook says.

• 8:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Eduardo.

• 8:47Chuck Nice?

  Eduardo.

• 8:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He's selling.

• 8:51Chuck Nice?

  Hello, my name is Eduardo.

• 8:55Chuck Nice?

  Perhaps you know my good friend Kitty Saftus.

• 9:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Who was that in Shrek?

• 9:02Chuck Nice?

  That's, um, what's his name? Antonio Banderas.

• 9:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Antonio Banderas.

• 9:06Chuck Nice?

  That's Puss in Boots.

• 9:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Puss in Boots in Shrek. That was really good.

• 9:08Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, I love it. Okay, so Eduardo says, can you explain to us in mortal language?

• 9:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  By the way, he's from Brooklyn. He's named Eddie.

• 9:20Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, that'd be funny.

• 9:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Who you are fantasizing about Shrek four.

• 9:25Chuck Nice?

  And he's sitting in Brooklyn. He's in Park Slope going, somebody going, yo Eddie! All right, can you explain to us in mortal language how the boson gives mass to matter? So how does Higgs work? The Higgs boson, how's it, how does it?

• 9:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 9:43Chuck Nice?

  How's it give mass?

• 9:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. So let me give my, let me attempt this, okay?

• 9:47Chuck Nice?

  That's a lot.

• 9:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you need to think of mass not as mass in the traditional sense and not in this explanation. Think of it as inertia, okay? So inertia in common parlance is the tendency of something to want to stay in motion. But it's also the opposite of that or the inverse of that. It's the tendency of something to not want to move.

• 10:10Chuck Nice?

  To stay at rest.

• 10:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay?

• 10:11Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 10:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. So inertia is whatever the thing's doing.

• 10:15Chuck Nice?

  It wants to do that.

• 10:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's what it wants to keep doing. All right, that's it. Okay.

• 10:18Chuck Nice?

  Inertia.

• 10:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 10:19Chuck Nice?

  Lazy.

• 10:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you can measure the mass of something by finding a way to measure the inertia that it, that it wields.

• 10:28Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 10:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so now watch. Let's go to Hollywood.

• 10:31Chuck Nice?

  All right.

• 10:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And we're going to a Hollywood party.

• 10:33Chuck Nice?

  Okay. I'm already uncomfortable. I used to have a drug problem. No, go ahead, go ahead.

• 10:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Pick an, pick an actor who like no one has heard of, that you know of.

• 10:44Chuck Nice?

  Chuck Nice.

• 10:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You acted a couple of things.

• 10:50Chuck Nice?

  Ah.

• 10:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What have you been in?

• 10:52Chuck Nice?

  Oh, please, let's not embarrass.

• 10:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, tell me one, tell me one.

• 10:54Chuck Nice?

  Um, I just did Kevin Can Wait.

• 10:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, Kevin Can Wait, the TV series.

• 10:59Chuck Nice?

  And it got cancelled.

• 11:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 11:02Chuck Nice?

  I did an episode and they were like, oh, this is over.

• 11:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This will never. He broke it.

• 11:07Chuck Nice?

  There we go, but anyway, go ahead.

• 11:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so Chuck Nice walks into a party.

• 11:12Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 11:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In Hollywood. And, and the bar is on the opposite side of the floor.

• 11:20Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 11:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, it's a crowded party.

• 11:22Chuck Nice?

  All right.

• 11:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You want a drink.

• 11:24Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 11:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You walk straight to the bar.

• 11:26Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely.

• 11:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You'll get there in 10 seconds.

• 11:28Chuck Nice?

  Of course I will.

• 11:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. Beyonce walks in.

• 11:32Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 11:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  She wants to go to the bar.

• 11:35Chuck Nice?

  Thank God, because I'm already there.

• 11:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  She's wants to go to the bar.

• 11:40Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 11:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But what happens? She begins to accrete.

• 11:44Chuck Nice?

  Beyonce, oh my God, Beyonce.

• 11:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  People, that's correct.

• 11:46Chuck Nice?

  Beyonce, oh my God.

• 11:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  She can't get to the bar in 10 seconds.

• 11:50Chuck Nice?

  No way.

• 11:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  She has a very high, uh, uh, uh, famous person mass. Because everyone wants to be around her. And so her, her posse moves slowly through the room.

• 12:06Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 12:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And if you move fast, you have low party inertia. She moves slow, she has hi- high party inertia, a resistance to going fast. Okay? So you have low resistance to going fast, you just walk right across the thing.

• 12:20Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 12:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So.

• 12:21Chuck Nice?

  Or no resistance.

• 12:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or no resistance, exactly. Yeah, people, in fact, if you're funky smelling, they're parked away.

• 12:27Chuck Nice?

  I was gonna say.

• 12:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You get there faster.

• 12:28Chuck Nice?

  If, if, if it's me, I go straight past the bar, out the back door. Because that's how much they actually want me at the party. Okay, but go ahead.

• 12:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right.

• 12:37Chuck Nice?

  So this is making sense so far.

• 12:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so this, think of it as the party field. Okay?

• 12:43Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 12:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The party field is giving mass to the particles moving through it.

• 12:50Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 12:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, that party field is like-

• 12:52Chuck Nice?

  Right, cuz those are the party goers.

• 12:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The Higgs field is like, they're like the party goers in Los Angeles.

• 13:00Chuck Nice?

  In Los Angeles.

• 13:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 13:01Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 13:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you got that? So, so if you, the more famous you are, the slower you can move through a crowd cuz everybody wants a piece of you.

• 13:08Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 13:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, so, in that way, Beyonce has a very high party mass, you have a very low party mass.

• 13:15Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 13:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And you get everybody else in between.

• 13:17Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 13:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, that's kinda what the Higgs field is doing. It is the resistance of, to movement of the particles that pass through it.

• 13:26Chuck Nice?

  God, first of all, it's a, just a great picture, you know?

• 13:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cuz we can all imagine that, right?

• 13:33Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, that's a great depiction.

• 13:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 13:35Chuck Nice?

  And that is fascinating, like, who, who thought of that?

• 13:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't know, I might have heard it somewhere, I don't remember.

• 13:43Chuck Nice?

  That's awesome.

• 13:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 13:44Chuck Nice?

  I mean, that's probably the best way you're ever gonna understand.

• 13:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I think so, I think so, yeah.

• 13:49Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, that's great.

• 13:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 13:51Chuck Nice?

  That is really, really good.

• 13:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, and one other little thing that we learned from Jana.

• 13:54Chuck Nice?

  Uh-huh.

• 13:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, friend of StarTalk.

• 13:56Chuck Nice?

  Jan 11.

• 13:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jan 11.

• 13:58Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 13:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Um, that grants particles its mass, but it's not most of the mass of the universe. Most of the mass in atoms comes from the force fields inside the atom, not from the particles themselves.

• 14:15Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 14:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Binding energy of the, of the atoms. So, so, yes, it gives mass to quarks and electrons and this sort of thing, yes. But, the total mass of everything in the universe is not represented by the Higgs field. It's just the particles within, that are out there. Okay, so just a little detail. And I, that was straight, I got straightened out on that by Jana.

• 14:36Chuck Nice?

  That's cool, man. Well, that's all really good stuff. Man, Eduardo, I hope that cleared some of these up.

• 14:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cleared. We're gonna take a quick break. When we come back, more, more, you gotta take us out in that voice, go, go.

• 14:53Chuck Nice?

  Stay tuned, more StarTalk cosmic conundrums when we return.

• 15:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're back. Startalk. Sorry, did I do it too? Sorry, I'm like, I don't have, I don't have it. I don't have the, the, what should we call that?

• 15:31Chuck Nice?

  Uh, that is an accent, that's all.

• 15:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I guess so, I don't have the accent.

• 15:35Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, keep going, cosmic conundrums.

• 15:38Chuck Nice?

  Here we are, alright, here we go, um...

• 15:42Chuck Nice?

  Woo, here we go. Jenny Totten wants to know this, she's coming to us from Facebook. Uh, "Hey Neil, does time move faster at the expanding edge of the universe and slower at the center?" Now, in, in there, there are some assumptions that I don't know, I don't know.

• 16:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mmm.

• 16:04Chuck Nice?

  You might have to talk to, first of all, the center part, and I don't know.

• 16:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mmm.

• 16:10Chuck Nice?

  However, I love the question in terms of the expanding edge.

• 16:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, here's something interesting, might not be what you were thinking.

• 16:17Chuck Nice?

  Alright.

• 16:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If you're moving away from me-

• 16:20Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  -in an expanding universe-

• 16:23Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And you have a clock that's ticking seconds, okay? If I watch that clock, consecutive seconds will, that I observe, will come to me more and more delayed.

• 16:40Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so when I observe you, it will look like you have slowed down.

• 16:45Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 16:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But as far as you're concerned, you're just running a stoppage. That's right, that's right. So, so, when she talked about the expanding edge, if you're gonna watch that edge-

• 16:55Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 16:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You will see things slow down in that place.

• 17:01Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 17:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, but, it's not an actual edge.

• 17:04Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 17:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's not a physical edge, it's just a, it's a horizon where you, that's all that is. If you go to that edge, now you're in the middle of a new horizon that is itself whatever distance away it would need to be-

• 17:18Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 17:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  -if you did the math on that.

• 17:20Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 17:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, if any, the way to answer that is, if you wanna make any of that true, it's the opposite of what she said.

• 17:26Chuck Nice?

  Got you.

• 17:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You'd be observing objects evolve more slowly on the edge, the, the expanding edge, and you, relative to you.

• 17:34Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 17:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 17:34Chuck Nice?

  Got you.

• 17:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 17:36Chuck Nice?

  That's pretty cool, actually.

• 17:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:38Chuck Nice?

  That's, that's pretty dope, I gotta say. I like that. All right, let's go to Virgil Hayward. And Virgil says, um, it's pretty cool, man. I gotta tell you, these people, they're into this stuff.

• 17:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We got good people.

• 17:54Chuck Nice?

  We do.

• 17:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We got good people.

• 17:55Chuck Nice?

  Damn. He says, is there any theoretical way to destroy a black hole?

• 18:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, yeah.

• 18:05Chuck Nice?

  Yeah?

• 18:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. Uh, you just wait around till it evaporates.

• 18:08Chuck Nice?

  Aw, man. Gave me the okey doke. That's the okey doke.

• 18:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm sorry. It's an answer. It's the answer. You just wait around. Small ones evaporate faster.

• 18:18Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 18:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Big ones, like the ones in the centers of galaxies, they, they might take, I don't know.

• 18:25Chuck Nice?

  A trillion years?

• 18:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, whoa, wait. Oh, much longer than that.

• 18:27Chuck Nice?

  What?

• 18:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

• 18:29Chuck Nice?

  A Google years?

• 18:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, Google years. I'll give it a Google. By the way, Google people is an actual number.

• 18:34Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 18:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it was a number before it was the name of a corporation, okay?

• 18:37Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 18:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it's spelled differently, G-O-O-G-O-L, or Google.

• 18:40Chuck Nice?

  Well, they actually misspelled it.

• 18:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, they misspelled it for the company.

• 18:43Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 18:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, Google years is a one followed by a hundred zeros. Then you could evaporate the, the seriously large, massive, um, black holes in the centers of galaxies. And, yeah, then the, in that future, it'll be a universe with nothing. Cause all the stars would have died. The proton would have decayed.

• 19:02Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 19:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, the very foundations of matter would have broken up into fundamental particles and...

• 19:07Chuck Nice?

  Really, all you have is particles.

• 19:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Particles. Exactly. That's all you have. That's all you have.

• 19:10Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 19:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The fundamental particles of the cosmos. So, the universe will end not with a bang, but with a whimper.

• 19:17Chuck Nice?

  Cool.

• 19:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And not in fire, but in ice.

• 19:22Chuck Nice?

  Cool. Literally.

• 19:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cosmic conundrum. Cool.

• 19:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cool. That reminds me, there's a line in, in Back to the Future, the, the second one.

• 19:32Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 19:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Where, I think it's the second. No, well, the first. Whichever one it is, Marty keeps saying, whoa, that's heavy. Oh, that's heavy. And Doc says, why do you keep saying it's, because it's 1955, right? Why do you keep saying it's heavy? Is something wrong with Earth's gravity in the future? That's exactly what I would have asked if I were Doc.

• 19:50Chuck Nice?

  I like that.

• 19:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 19:51Chuck Nice?

  All right.

• 19:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It was Back to Future 1.

• 19:53Chuck Nice?

  So, yeah, there you have it, Virgil. It's, um, wait is your answer.

• 19:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We'll just wait around.

• 19:58Chuck Nice?

  You gotta wait, bro.

• 19:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, that's why we don't, we don't know any way to undo the black hole.

• 20:02Chuck Nice?

  Right. The theoretical way to destroy it is time. There you go. All right, here we go. Lee C. Schneider from Facebook says, which is more likely? Extraterrestrial contact celestially or interdimensionally?

• 20:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, definitely physically. Dimensions, we don't, we, no, no.

• 20:22Chuck Nice?

  No.

• 20:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, I want it to be true.

• 20:24Chuck Nice?

  You do?

• 20:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, yes. Well, access to higher dimensions? Come on now.

• 20:27Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 20:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I think we even did a thing on going to the fourth dimension from the three dimensions, two dimensions.

• 20:33Chuck Nice?

  With those sphere that drops through a piece of paper.

• 20:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Exactly.

• 20:35Chuck Nice?

  Which is a, just a painterly beautiful.

• 20:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You love that analogy?

• 20:40Chuck Nice?

  I do, because it makes things so easy.

• 20:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so if you have an intersection of dimensions, the consequences can be extraordinary.

• 20:51Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 20:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So if we live inside a sheet of paper and a three-dimensional being says, I've got this sphere, and they don't even know what a sphere is, all they have are circles. Ha, ha, ha, right? So a circle is a sphere in two dimensions. Or a sphere is a circle in three dimensions. You can say it either way. So if I'm a mighty three-dimensional creature and I take a sphere, a hollow sphere, and I pass it through your universe.

• 21:15Chuck Nice?

  Right, my paper universe.

• 21:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How would you describe this? You say, oh, there's a dot. Where did that dot come from?

• 21:22Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 21:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's mysterious.

• 21:23Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 21:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Then the dot becomes a circle.

• 21:26Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 21:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Now, you only know it's hollow in the inside because I have to open up a portal so you can look in. Otherwise, it's just a, you wouldn't know it's hollow.

• 21:33Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 21:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But anyhow, so it's a circle. And what happens to the circle? It grows.

• 21:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Until what size?

• 21:39Chuck Nice?

  Until it's the diameter of the.

• 21:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Till the full diameter of the sphere, and then what happens?

• 21:43Chuck Nice?

  And then it would shrink.

• 21:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Shrink down and then becomes a point and then disappears completely. And you have to explain that to your friends.

• 21:49Chuck Nice?

  Right. That is so cool.

• 21:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So imagine a four dimensional thing passing through our universe.

• 21:54Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 21:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That would be, how would you even describe? You'd see a cube show up in the middle of nowhere and then disappear.

• 22:01Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That would be the three dimensional slice of the four dimensional hypercube passing through our three dimensional world.

• 22:10Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 22:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So in other words, the two dimensional slice of the sphere is a circle.

• 22:15Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Passing through your, your, your paper world.

• 22:17Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The three dimensional slice through a four dimensional hypercube is just a cube.

• 22:23Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 22:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So the cube will start small, get bigger, and then shrink down again, disappear.

• 22:28Chuck Nice?

  Damn. Wow.

• 22:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't know, dimensions are cool. So that, I don't know how to access another dimension. I wouldn't even know where to begin. So I'm, I will bet that we will contact extraterrestrials. Before we have, before we know how to go in and out of higher dimensions.

• 22:42Chuck Nice?

  Right, but the idea it would be that, so here's what I want to tack on to this though. How would, they would know how to observe us, but how would we ever be able to observe them though?

• 22:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If they, if they're a higher dimensions.

• 22:57Chuck Nice?

  Yes, they're the higher dimensions.

• 22:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They could observe us and we would not even know they were there.

• 23:00Chuck Nice?

  Never even know they were there.

• 23:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct.

• 23:01Chuck Nice?

  So then, you know, oh, okay, and so then what we would only be able to observe is what they are able to put into our.

• 23:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, not to put into it, to pass through it.

• 23:11Chuck Nice?

  Not put in, but pass through our reality.

• 23:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, I guess they could put, they could put it in our reality, but it was to be so, their reality is so much richer, it'd be, they'd want to just pass it through.

• 23:23Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 23:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's like, so let me, let me give the, the, the paper people something to play with and just draw a circle, you know?

• 23:29Chuck Nice?

  Right, exactly. That's not going to do much.

• 23:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, right.

• 23:32Chuck Nice?

  So we would observe that we would never be able to observe their universe.

• 23:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Unless we had access out of our dimensions to their dimension, that's correct.

• 23:39Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 23:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Now, here's something interesting, ready?

• 23:40Chuck Nice?

  Go ahead.

• 23:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If you're a two dimensional being.

• 23:45Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 23:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And you have skin, so you draw the skin. We have an insides.

• 23:50Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 23:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We three dimensional beings would be able to see inside their bodies. The heart, the lungs, the mouth, the eyes, everything.

• 23:58Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 23:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But they would not be able to, because they can only see in the paper. And they would just see the outer skin, which is just a line.

• 24:05Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 24:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What that means is a four dimensional person can see every one of our organs at all times.

• 24:12Chuck Nice?

  I feel so naked. Just, I feel vile.

• 24:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They can see inside your organs.

• 24:17Chuck Nice?

  That's cool.

• 24:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So surgery, the future of surgery could be four dimensional surgery. Where they come at you from a fourth dimension and never have to cut you open. Think about that.

• 24:28Chuck Nice?

  I like it.

• 24:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's a sci fi story right, right there.

• 24:31Chuck Nice?

  Gotta tell you, never gonna happen in America. Not with this healthcare.

• 24:38Chuck Nice?

  That's all I can say. Yo, that is so cool. Well, hey, Lee, thanks so much for that question, man. That's very, very cool. Um, let's go with.

• 24:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Time for a couple more questions.

• 24:48Chuck Nice?

  Okay. Mario. Fer. Ferreri. Ferrera. Ferrera.

• 24:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ferrera.

• 24:56Chuck Nice?

  Ferrera.

• 24:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mario.

• 24:57Chuck Nice?

  Mario Ferrera. Uh, says, do you think it's possible we'll find complex organisms? Like fish in the liquid water masses in the planets and moons of. He says, our solar system.

• 25:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, okay, so first. A fish is a way complex organism, right? Generally, when biologists speak of complex organism, they're not talking about fish.

• 25:19Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 25:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They're talking about multicellular creatures that have, might have some appendages. They might have, um, like at the Cambrian explosion of life. When was that, four hundred and fifty, five hundred million years ago? There, we went from single celled creatures rapidly. When the conditions changed on earth to multicellular life. And that multicellular life had like limbs and eyes and antennae. It had features.

• 25:45Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 25:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That you could talk about and point to.

• 25:47Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 25:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Generally, we call that complex life.

• 25:50Chuck Nice?

  Complex.

• 25:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, and then you want to.

• 25:51Chuck Nice?

  So how about, how about it's a single cell organism, but it has propulsion, like.

• 25:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, you mean a way to move around.

• 25:59Chuck Nice?

  A way to move around.

• 25:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, that'd still be simple. If it's single cell.

• 26:01Chuck Nice?

  Single cell is still not, it's still simple.

• 26:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct.

• 26:03Chuck Nice?

  Okay, even if it's moving or not.

• 26:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Even if it couldn't do all that, but we're talking about, I got legs and I got eyeballs.

• 26:08Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 26:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I got a nose and ears, that sort of thing.

• 26:10Chuck Nice?

  That thing.

• 26:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's complex.

• 26:11Chuck Nice?

  Features, as you said.

• 26:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, the question was, um, will we find something, okay. I want to find life in the oceans beneath the frozen surfaces of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn. And I, I want there to be life there.

• 26:30Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But I'm, if there isn't, uh, you know, okay, I'll deal. I'll recover. But if there is life, it'll be something that swims. It'll be something that, and think of all the things in the ocean that swim that are not fish.

• 26:43Chuck Nice?

  That's so true.

• 26:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What swims or that is alive, like coral.

• 26:46Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 26:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You have, uh, shellfish.

• 26:47Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 26:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, I, I mean, you know, uh, uh, swimming fish, right? So, uh, who else do we have? We have Ariel, is there?

• 26:57Chuck Nice?

  Sebastian.

• 26:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, Sebastian. I can't forget Sebastian. Yeah, the hermit crab.

• 27:01Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 27:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, the hermit crab, oh, he's got a Jamaican accent.

• 27:03Chuck Nice?

  Why you do this to your father?

• 27:06Chuck Nice?

  Ariel. Your father, he love you so bad.

• 27:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, you got Ariel, Sebastian, you got, um, you've got, uh, what else? You've got sponges.

• 27:19Chuck Nice?

  Sponges.

• 27:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, I mean, just, uh.

• 27:20Chuck Nice?

  Clams and oysters.

• 27:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You got SpongeBob is down there. Yes, SpongeBob.

• 27:24Chuck Nice?

  SpongeBob.

• 27:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so, oh, uh, who's the starfish in SpongeBob?

• 27:29Chuck Nice?

  Uh, Patrick.

• 27:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Patrick, of course.

• 27:30Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 27:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I was confused with Mr. Woodward. Would, uh.

• 27:33Chuck Nice?

  Squidward.

• 27:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Squidward.

• 27:34Chuck Nice?

  You know, I just realized I know too much about SpongeBob. That was too easy for me.

• 27:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That was. You didn't even, let me think about it.

• 27:42Chuck Nice?

  And I.

• 27:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, you did.

• 27:44Chuck Nice?

  That was way too easy for me, man. That should not have happened.

• 27:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That should not have happened.

• 27:48Chuck Nice?

  You know, we doing a show about astrophysics, Eli, and who is, who's SpongeBob?

• 27:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Laying out the SpongeBob character.

• 27:54Chuck Nice?

  Oh, Patrick and the nurse, Mr. Crab, and of course, there's Squidward and. Oh, God.

• 27:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And, and who's, who's the squirrel? Sandy.

• 28:02Chuck Nice?

  Sandy, that's right. Thank you.

• 28:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. So anyhow, where was I? Where the hell was I?

• 28:07Chuck Nice?

  So you're saying if, if the life is gonna be there, it's going to have features and you know, you want that.

• 28:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It could be, I mean, think about it. It'll be at least as exotic as the range of creatures that are exotic in our own ocean. Exactly.

• 28:21Chuck Nice?

  And the, and the funny thing is the deeper you go in our ocean, the more exotic the life becomes.

• 28:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. Well, well, the, unless you've seen it before. Unless they've seen you. You look exotic to them too. We gotta take a break.

• 28:33Chuck Nice?

  Thank you.

• 28:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  When we come back, that was not a compliment Chuck.

• 28:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cosmic queries, cosmic conundrums when we come back.

• 28:50Chuck Nice?

  Hey, we'd like to give a Patreon shout out to the following Patreon patrons. Daniel R. Scott and Sand McDowell. Thank you so much, guys, for your help. Without you, we couldn't make this show. And for those of you who are listening, who would like your very own Patreon shout out, go to patreon.com/startalkradio and support us. We'll love you for it.

• 29:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're back. Cosmic queries, cosmic conundrums. Very nice. Chuck.

• 29:25Chuck Nice?

  Yes, sir.

• 29:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Bring him on.

• 29:26Chuck Nice?

  All right, let's just jump right back into this. Uh, this is Ross.

• 29:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Good question so far.

• 29:31Chuck Nice?

  These are very good questions so far. Uh, Ross Nippold says, uh, do you?

• 29:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, just one thing about the previous segment's question.

• 29:40Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 29:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, asking about what kind of life we might find, if we find life in the oceans or thing. Just there's, it's not only if there's water there.

• 29:49Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 29:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. I just wanna get thermodynamic on you.

• 29:51Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 29:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 29:52Chuck Nice?

  Go for it.

• 29:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. As far as we know. Whatever life is, it will require metabolism.

• 30:00Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 30:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, it'll have to process energy in some way.

• 30:04Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 30:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  For it to process energy, in its environment, there has to be a place that has more energy than in another place.

• 30:15Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 30:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So that there is energy flow.

• 30:18Chuck Nice?

  Yes, exactly. Like our sun.

• 30:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If the entire ocean

• 30:22Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 30:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  were exactly the same temperature, and there were no water currents, and there was no source of energy, we don't know how life could come to be, or exist, or even thrive.

• 30:35Chuck Nice?

  So life does not happen without a transference of energy?

• 30:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct. And technically, you'd call that an energy gradient.

• 30:41Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 30:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay?

• 30:42Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 30:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, that's what you need.

• 30:46Chuck Nice?

  Alright.

• 30:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And, and so, under there, there's sources of energy from, like, the gravitational stress from Jupiter and from Saturn, and other moons, on those moons, and that pumps energy, like, deep in the center, and so...

• 31:00Chuck Nice?

  So, wha- wha- wha- wha-

• 31:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If, if it's hotter in the center than in the edge, then we're good.

• 31:05Chuck Nice?

  So you mean the gravitational forces of the planet that this moon is orbiting?

• 31:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 31:13Chuck Nice?

  Causes-

• 31:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Title forces.

• 31:14Chuck Nice?

  The tidal forces, causes an undulation-

• 31:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 31:17Chuck Nice?

  That creates energy heat-

• 31:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 31:20Chuck Nice?

  Like when you bend a, a paperclip back and forth, back and forth.

• 31:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A better example would be when they say, "If you're gonna play racquetball, let's warm up the ball." And what are you doing? You hit the ball. You squeeze it and pops back out.

• 31:33Chuck Nice?

  It's a deformation-

• 31:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And a reclamation. And every time you do that, you're pumping energy into the ball from your racket. That's what's going on to those moons right now.

• 31:42Chuck Nice?

  Alright, that's, that's-

• 31:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's dope.

• 31:44Chuck Nice?

  That's really dope.

• 31:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And the hottest moon in the solar system-

• 31:48Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 31:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  is called Io, and it's closest moon to Jupiter, and it's feeling this ferociously, and it's got the most ferocious volcanoes that ever were, 'cause it's hot in the middle, the stuff has gotta get out, and it, and it, it's, it's hurling.

• 32:02Chuck Nice?

  And that, and that, and that is, that is basically from gravity, that's, that's-

• 32:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Gravity stress.

• 32:07Chuck Nice?

  Gravity stress.

• 32:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 32:08Chuck Nice?

  Stress of gravity.

• 32:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Pumping it. And it's, by the way, it's outside of the Goldilocks zone.

• 32:13Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 32:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we used to think, "Oh, you need the sun, and it's gotta be just right." And no, you just need energy.

• 32:17Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 32:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, there you go. Okay.

• 32:21Chuck Nice?

  Damn.

• 32:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright.

• 32:22Chuck Nice?

  God, I just love science. It's so good. That is so. Alright. Alright, Roy Luckett from Facebook says this.

• 32:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Roy what?

• 32:33Chuck Nice?

  Uh, Luckett.

• 32:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Luckett?

• 32:35Chuck Nice?

  Luckett.

• 32:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's a word?

• 32:36Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 32:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's a name, okay.

• 32:37Chuck Nice?

  That's a name, man.

• 32:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, Roy.

• 32:38Chuck Nice?

  Roy says, "Hey Neil."

• 32:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Roy Luckett, that's a cowboy name. Hey, I'm Roy Luckett.

• 32:43Chuck Nice?

  How y'all doing?

• 32:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm Roy Luckett.

• 32:46Chuck Nice?

  Welcome to the Grand Ole Opry. I'm Roy Luckett.

• 32:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Come on by for the rodeo.

• 32:51Chuck Nice?

  Alright. Roy Luckett says this, "Hey Neil, let's talk about low orbit."

• 32:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Nice.

• 32:56Chuck Nice?

  And that's all he says.

• 32:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so, is that all?

• 33:00Chuck Nice?

  That's it.

• 33:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh.

• 33:01Chuck Nice?

  That's why I wanted to read it, cuz who writes that question?

• 33:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's cool. Roy Luckett said that.

• 33:06Chuck Nice?

  Roy Luckett, and you know what that does?

• 33:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He's kicking back with a beer, and he wants to talk to me. Bring it on, right?

• 33:11Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 33:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, so.

• 33:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Um, ooh, how, how, how deep into this rabbit hole do you want to go?

• 33:21Chuck Nice?

  I don't know, man.

• 33:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, you ready?

• 33:23Chuck Nice?

  Low orbit.

• 33:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Low, you ready?

• 33:24Chuck Nice?

  Go.

• 33:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't think you're ready.

• 33:26Chuck Nice?

  Alright.

• 33:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Are you ready?

• 33:27Chuck Nice?

  I'm, I'm about as ready as I'm ever gonna be.

• 33:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As ready as you think you can be for what I'm about to tell you?

• 33:31Chuck Nice?

  That's right.

• 33:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, so, doesn't it make sense to you that people, this is like inside baseball here, okay? Just be ready for this.

• 33:39Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 33:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Doesn't it make sense to you that on Earth's equator?

• 33:42Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 33:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  People weigh a little less than people anywhere else on Earth because of the centrifugal force of Earth's rotation?

• 33:52Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 33:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, the equator is moving the fastest.

• 33:56Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 33:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Basically, a thousand miles an hour.

• 33:58Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 33:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because we have 25,000 miles in the circumference, and how long does it take Earth to rotate once?

• 34:04Chuck Nice?

  24 hours.

• 34:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  About 24 hours. See, divide those, it's about a thousand miles in an hour, about, okay? Alright. If you had a different latitude, the circle you take in 24 hours is smaller. Right on down to the pole, where Santa's got no circle at all, he's just pirouetting.

• 34:20Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 34:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay?

• 34:21Chuck Nice?

  Very nice.

• 34:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, so, yes, we're rotating as a solid object, but the folks moving the fastest are right on the equator. And I forgot the, I did the calculation once, they weigh about, you know, four ounces, about a quarter of a pound less.

• 34:35Chuck Nice?

  That's a lot.

• 34:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, no, it's a lot. No, it's very, it's measurable, it's measurable with a household scale.

• 34:39Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, I was gonna say, I thought you were gonna come up with some like, you know.

• 34:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, micro something. No, no, no, no, it's real. It's real. Okay.

• 34:45Chuck Nice?

  Okay, that's cool. That's cool. So far, so good.

• 34:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So let's spin Earth faster.

• 34:50Chuck Nice?

  Alright.

• 34:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They'll weigh even less.

• 34:52Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 34:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Poor Santa, his weight doesn't change at all.

• 34:55Chuck Nice?

  Right. Well, because first of all, he's fat. Let's be honest.

• 35:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, he's just pirouetting.

• 35:02Chuck Nice?

  Of course.

• 35:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So there's no, there's no centrifugal force on the pole.

• 35:05Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 35:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. So, that's what Taylor said. Now you weigh a pound less.

• 35:09Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 35:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or kilogram, whatever is your favorite unit. We just keep doing this. And you can ask yourself, at what speed

• 35:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  must I rotate Earth so that you don't weigh anything? You'll just float there on the equator. That's an askable question, isn't it?

• 35:30Chuck Nice?

  It is.

• 35:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If I'm spinning you up and you're weighing less and less and less.

• 35:33Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 35:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know what speed that is?

• 35:35Chuck Nice?

  What?

• 35:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You rotate the Earth once every 90 minutes.

• 35:39Chuck Nice?

  Every ni- instead of 24 hours.

• 35:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 35:42Chuck Nice?

  It's an hour and a half.

• 35:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  An hour and a half.

• 35:44Chuck Nice?

  And everything on Earth would just fly out into space.

• 35:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Everything on the equator.

• 35:48Chuck Nice?

  Everything on the equator, because that's right.

• 35:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Everything on the equator.

• 35:50Chuck Nice?

  Because the other stuff doesn't weigh as much.

• 35:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's, okay?

• 35:52Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 35:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, the other stuff doesn't have as much centrifugal force.

• 35:55Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 35:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, so.

• 35:58Chuck Nice?

  I noticed, go ahead, keep going, keep going.

• 36:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so wait a minute.

• 36:00Chuck Nice?

  Keep going.

• 36:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So if I'm on the equator now,

• 36:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  and my feet aren't even touching the ground.

• 36:06Chuck Nice?

  I'm just floating.

• 36:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just floating.

• 36:07Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 36:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yet somehow I'm staying with Earth, as you had always been, even up to that moment.

• 36:13Chuck Nice?

  Correct.

• 36:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Up to that moment. You're there, now you just weigh one pound. You can jump high, but you're still rotating with Earth. You rotate Earth a little extra, now you're just floating.

• 36:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I just described for you orbit.

• 36:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Low Earth orbit.

• 36:33Chuck Nice?

  You know, I forgot that that's where we're going.

• 36:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's where we're going!

• 36:36Chuck Nice?

  That is.

• 36:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Do you know how long it takes the space station to orbit the Earth? 90 minutes.

• 36:43Chuck Nice?

  So that, oh wow, that is cool, man. I dig it.

• 36:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is, is that good?

• 36:48Chuck Nice?

  That's it.

• 36:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is that good?

• 36:49Chuck Nice?

  That makes sense.

• 36:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is that good?

• 36:51Chuck Nice?

  That's good.

• 36:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's an orbit.

• 36:52Chuck Nice?

  I love it.

• 36:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so low Earth orbit is not, now, of course.

• 36:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Low Earth orbit, in practice, you wanna be above enough of the atmosphere so you're not, you know, burning up through the atmosphere. Of course, right. You wanna be high enough. So that you go up 100 kilometers, about 60 miles. You're high enough above most of the atmosphere so that you can now orbit the Earth faster than the Earth would take you. Mm-hmm. And that's, and you complete one orbit in 90 minutes. If you're right exactly above Earth's surface, it's actually 88 minutes. Okay, right. Okay? If you do the math, it's 88 minutes. You go up to where a space station is, about 90 minutes. Gotcha. Okay? All that's low Earth orbit. LEO, we call it affectionately. LEO, low Earth orbit. Yeah. You go a little higher up. Right. Uh, uh, uh, 500 miles up, that kinda thing. You get to, uh, MEO.

• 37:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm. Uh, medium Earth, middle Earth orbit. Okay. Not middle Earth. Right. But middle Earth orbit. Middle, okay? Right. And there you'll find the GPS satellites. Okay. All right? So they'll do an orbit, it'll take longer than an hour and a half, but slower than 24 hours. Okay. Okay? Then you go a little higher, you get GEO. Mm-hmm. Geosynchronous orbit. So these are orbits where, oh no, you can do the opposite and say, if I go farther away, um, I can stay in orbit with a lower and lower speed. Okay? Here's Earth turning beneath my feet. Is there a distance where I can orbit exactly with the rotation of the Earth so that I take one orbit in 24 hours? Yes, there is.

• 38:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's 23,000 miles up, and it's called geosynchronous orbit. And there's the synchronicity. There's the synchronicity. Wow. So you launch that satellite, it just hovers overhead. That's very cool. And if you park one, park between Europe and the United States, you can beam signals up to it, and you can talk to beyond the curvature of the Earth. That's it. Elon Musk wants to launch constellations of satellites so that you don't have to beam out to 23,000 miles. You know why? Cause if you beam a light signal 23,000 miles, that's far enough away that the round trip, you notice that in telecommunications. It's a lag, right? There's a lag. It's a lag, you'll notice it. And sometimes you'll see it in a broadcast, or even in, sometimes you've been on a phone and there was a lag. That's probably hitting a geosynchronous.

• 39:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so communication, you want the satellites to be lower. Right. But if it's lower, you're not always in view of it. Right. Because its orbit's out of your zone. It doesn't stay with you, the thing. So now, if, once this goes out, you want another one coming in right behind it. Right. That's why Elon is launching hundreds of satellites. So that everyone has fast internet and with with no lag.

• 39:32Chuck Nice?

  Cool.

• 39:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 39:34Chuck Nice?

  Well, thank you, Elon. And and and thank you, Roy Luckett.

• 39:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Roy Luckett.

• 39:39Chuck Nice?

  Oh, damn, boy, I didn't know that was such a good question.

• 39:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Hell, Leo, right there. That was. Chuck, we got time for one more question. Make it a good one.

• 39:46Chuck Nice?

  All right.

• 39:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or make it a bad one. We'll make we'll turn it into a good one.

• 39:48Chuck Nice?

  Okay, Sean Faruk says this. Is a faraway planet, if a faraway planet emits a light of low frequency and light of high frequency, which one of them will win the race and reach us first?

• 40:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh.

• 40:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The speed of light in a vacuum does not discriminate by frequency.

• 40:14Chuck Nice?

  Boom. There you go.

• 40:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  However, if it goes through a medium.

• 40:21Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm.

• 40:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It does.

• 40:23Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 40:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it is because different frequencies move through media at different speeds.

• 40:30Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm.

• 40:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That the colors manifest after it comes through.

• 40:37Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 40:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So if you put light through a prism.

• 40:40Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm.

• 40:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And you put it in at the right angle, at the correct angle, the white light comes in and the prism says, blue, you're coming out first, red, you're coming out last, I'm spread. And when and since it's spread, since they go through at different speeds, all the colors reveal themselves as they come out of the prism.

• 40:58Chuck Nice?

  There you go, separating in the process.

• 41:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so that so so the prism is is is glass.

• 41:03Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 41:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That will, air will separate the colors.

• 41:06Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 41:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Um, diamond does it the best, is the is the most transparent. It's the most, it's the densest transparent thing we know.

• 41:13Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 41:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So that'll do it the most.

• 41:14Chuck Nice?

  Slows down the light.

• 41:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The most.

• 41:16Chuck Nice?

  Better than anything.

• 41:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And and it slows down light by to forty percent of its vacuum speed.

• 41:22Chuck Nice?

  Of course, that makes sense, which is when you look at a diamond and it refracts all the light.

• 41:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, the light reflects all the pretty colors.

• 41:28Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 41:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's what's going on. And it does that better than glass does.

• 41:31Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 41:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's why diamonds are diamonds and glass are glass.

• 41:34Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 41:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right?

• 41:34Chuck Nice?

  Don't tell my wife that.

• 41:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cubic siliconium gets you halfway there. I don't know. So, um, so different frequencies of light do travel at different speeds through a medium. And just to, just to make that clear. And so now there are, there is medium in space, like gas clouds. When light comes through there, you get this effect.

• 42:01Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 42:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That you get this effect. And you can get a time lag in an explosion if the explosion happens in multiple frequencies. You'll see it happen at one frequency before it does in another. And we have coordinated our telescopes to check for this.

• 42:13Chuck Nice?

  Nice.

• 42:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You have a radio telescope, a visible light telescope, a infrared telescope, and you can see phenomenon if it's coming through a medium that will differentially slow down the frequencies of light. No, it's very cool.

• 42:26Chuck Nice?

  That is excellent.

• 42:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. But in a vacuum?

• 42:29Chuck Nice?

  So, to, that's it. To tie.

• 42:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The speed of light is the speed of light.

• 42:33Chuck Nice?

  Speed of light, speed of light. That's very cool.

• 42:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. Neil deGrasse Tyson and Chuck Nice.

• 42:38Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 42:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Signing off from the Corona-verse, StarTalk Cosmic Queries. Keep looking out.