Cosmic Queries: Galactic Grab Bag

First time comic co-host Iliza Shlesinger reaches into our Galactic Grab Bag to ask host Neil Tyson questions from our fans about light sails and laser beams, black holes, the search for life in the universe, antimatter, and intelligent dinosaurs.

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.

• 0:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm your host, Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist, and this is StarTalk.

• 0:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As our longtime fans know, Cosmic Queries is when we bring in an in-house co-host comedian who reads questions from the universe, of the universe, drawn from our fanbase. And I've not seen the questions.

• 0:44Speaker 01

  Right.

• 0:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And we just have fun with it. And if I don't know the answer, I'm gonna tell you. If I don't know the answer, I'm gonna ask you if you know the answer.

• 0:50Speaker 01

  I absolutely know the answer.

• 0:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And if both of us don't know the answer, then we move on.

• 0:54Speaker 01

  You know how long I've spent staring at the cosmos, wondering where my Uber is? I've spent a lot of time in space.

• 1:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That brings to mind, if space travel becomes a thing, we would need Uber spacecraft.

• 1:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That would be interesting.

• 1:09Speaker 01

  College kids all over the place, just like, "I got a great way to make some money."

• 1:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yep.

• 1:12Speaker 01

  And there's no collisions.

• 1:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, actually, it's much harder to collide if you're moving in three dimensions than if you're only moving in two.

• 1:19Speaker 01

  I say this all the time. I say this all the time.

• 1:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a profound fact. So, think about traffic jams. You're in a traffic jam because you're on a road, and you can't go over or...

• 1:29Speaker 01

  On a single plane.

• 1:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it's not only in your single plane, on a road, you're on a one-dimensional path.

• 1:33Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Typically, there's more than one lane, though. Regardless, if you're stuck in traffic, all you have to do is go above or below. Introduce another dimension, you can pass all the traffic like this.

• 1:42Speaker 01

  And that's why we need space cars.

• 1:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Space cars.

• 1:44Speaker 01

  In this future, they always have them going through buildings.

• 1:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I know. That was my future that we tried to come up with and failed.

• 1:50Speaker 01

  Like, oh, good, like, so the fifth element was your idea? All those cabs and stuff?

• 1:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Flying cars. We, you know, we've been dreaming of flying cars since the 1950s.

• 1:56Speaker 01

  I know. And it will be a thing, and it's gonna be terrible.

• 1:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A flying car is no different from having a lot of bridges and tunnels.

• 2:02Speaker 01

  Right.

• 2:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It allows you to go above and below.

• 2:05Speaker 01

  It's a lot different in that there's nothing holding you to where you are. You got a bridge, you have to stay on that bridge. A flying car is just like, let's just be...

• 2:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  However, if the engine breaks of a flying car, you are a falling brick.

• 2:16Speaker 01

  True.

• 2:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's the difference between being on a bridge or in a tunnel.

• 2:18Speaker 01

  Right, okay, so there's pros and cons.

• 2:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, but in fact, I think we do have flying cars, they're called helicopters.

• 2:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, but helicopter is so expensive. That's how I got here. I've actually had that thought, I'm like, is there a way to get a helicopter? And I feel like these statistics for helicopters, I feel like they crash a lot.

• 2:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, because when the motor goes out, it's, you know, in a plane, if the engines die, it's a glider.

• 2:40Speaker 01

  For, yeah.

• 2:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And a helicopter, if the engines die.

• 2:42Speaker 01

  Straight down.

• 2:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Goes straight down.

• 2:44Speaker 01

  Shouldn't be an option that the engines die, like, that just shouldn't be an option.

• 2:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Shit happens.

• 2:48Speaker 01

  Right, so they're gonna have to have like, uh, like meteoroid insurance, or like asteroid insurance.

• 2:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, if you, if you're flying through space and you get hit by one, yeah.

• 2:56Speaker 01

  Like farmers, like, we better cover that.

• 2:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That would be one, I hadn't thought about that, but yeah, yeah, you could be hit by a micrometeorite going five miles per second, that would ruin your day.

• 3:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, debris from like our last space shuttles.

• 3:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That happens too.

• 3:07Speaker 01

  Engine part, it's a daisy. Okay, fair enough.

• 3:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So what do you have?

• 3:11Speaker 01

  Okay, so do I do the Patreon page?

• 3:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's your first time doing this, I hope it's not your, I hope it's not your last time.

• 3:17Speaker 01

  I hope it's not my last as well.

• 3:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, we'll be the, we'll judge that.

• 3:21Speaker 01

  We'll be the judge of that, that's why I gave you the doe eyes, trying to flirt my way, which has not gotten me far. Okay.

• 3:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, go for it.

• 3:27Speaker 01

  These first?

• 3:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so, so what happens, we have our Patreon supporters.

• 3:31Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 3:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, one of the guarantees they get, if they ask a question for Cosmic Queries, then we get to ask their question first.

• 3:37Speaker 01

  Okay, so I'm gonna ask this one because there was so, I'm gonna read it with the emphasis and the enthusiasm and the fervor that I feel they wrote this with.

• 3:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Good, go for it, feel, feel them.

• 3:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, also I'm thinking this person's also a fellow Jew, you're not Jewish, I am. Okay, here we go, uh, from Michael Cohen in Augusta, Georgia. It's weird that there's a Jew there. Hello, Dr. Tyson, this question burns in my mind. I asked NASA and wasn't satisfied with their answer.

• 4:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh.

• 4:04Speaker 01

  If light can't escape a black hole, then doesn't that mean that the escape velocity of a black hole beyond the event horizon exceeds the speed of light itself? Could black holes be the exception to the speed of light as we know it? Thank you, at Cosmic Cohen.

• 4:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow, that was, that was beautiful.

• 4:21Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 4:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That was totally, you embodied whoever that Cohen person is.

• 4:25Speaker 01

  I omitted the fact that you missed use than instead of then, no big deal.

• 4:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Did I say than?

• 4:29Speaker 01

  Oh no, he did.

• 4:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, okay.

• 4:30Speaker 01

  Pointing out the one part that I understand, which is literature and.

• 4:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He's the one Jew in Augusta, Georgia.

• 4:35Speaker 01

  And represent. Okay, that was the question about.

• 4:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, yeah, so it's, uh, the question is stated accurately. There are two ways to think about the black hole. One of them is that beyond, inside the event horizon, the escape velocity is greater than the speed of light. That's kind of a classical way to think about it, but what has actually happened is the spacetime curvature has basically closed in on itself. There is no path out of the black hole that you can take, no matter what. And so not even a beam of light can get out. So that is all true. You can't get out. By the way, just because the speed of light required, just because to get out of a black hole requires you travel faster than light, doesn't mean that you are. And so.

• 5:17Speaker 01

  Doesn't mean you can't.

• 5:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, doesn't mean you can. Right, right, right. So we're all cool. Relativity is fine.

• 5:22Speaker 01

  It's really hypothetical because you physically can't do it.

• 5:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct.

• 5:25Speaker 01

  So it's all in theory.

• 5:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There is no known law of physics or observation that would enable you to escape a black hole.

• 5:30Speaker 01

  Not even if you take the subway.

• 5:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, correct. So, so, yeah, yeah. So I'm, I'm disappointed that they couldn't get a good answer from NASA. I wonder where they asked.

• 5:38Speaker 01

  I feel like NASA was like, please stop tweeting at us. Like the Russians are hot on our tail. We've got bigger things to deal with. Please stop. Here's a mug and a hat.

• 5:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How did you know that?

• 5:47Speaker 01

  Because they're always hot on our tail. Haven't you been to the movies? Okay. Would you like a real question?

• 5:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, any, yeah, give me whatever you got.

• 5:54Speaker 01

  Okay. Um, this one's, is the Martian based on a true story? I'm just kidding.

• 6:01Speaker 01

  Okay, this one's a good one.

• 6:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm not authorized to answer that question.

• 6:04Speaker 01

  I saw that movie and I was like, I guarantee if I tweet this, people will be like, oh my God, I thought so. I read the book. All right. This is from Jeff Gerchen, uh, at Jeff Gerchen. Does space smell?

• 6:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh, yeah. So I, I once tweeted an answer to that question. So somebody is not a follower.

• 6:22Speaker 01

  So you know what? Go back and look it up. Cause you're lazy and there's no lazy in space. There's no lays in space.

• 6:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So here's what happens. Uh, smell is a chemical phenomenon.

• 6:33Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 6:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it involves molecules interacting with your, your, your olfactory glands. And in, in the vacuum of space where there are not insufficient molecules to trigger that. No, you're not smelling a damn thing.

• 6:44Speaker 01

  So it has to do with the molecules outside and inside. It's not just.

• 6:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Molecules are outside, they come inside and then you have smell what was outside, right? You're inhaling. So now here's a way to smell something. If you face the sun. And the sun starts singeing your, your, your skin on your face. Then you'll, then it'll burn and then you'll smell the burning flesh.

• 7:06Speaker 01

  How long are you facing the sun though?

• 7:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Um.

• 7:08Speaker 01

  And how close? Are you saying?

• 7:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You have to be, uh, if you're close enough and you make this, yeah, it'll, you'll, you'll get singed. And you'll smell, you'll smell the, the singed outer skin layers.

• 7:18Speaker 01

  That's horrific.

• 7:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just saying, you want to smell something in space. That's how you smell something.

• 7:21Speaker 01

  Well, smell something in space. I got some, wait, is that why we sneeze when we stare at the sun? Cause it's slowly singeing our nose hairs?

• 7:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I have ne- uh, uh, that's never happened to me. Who told you that? That happens?

• 7:31Speaker 01

  I do it. If I gotta sneeze, uh, or, uh, sometimes any light source, even artificial. And you go like that, and they sneeze, stare right at the sun if you gotta sneeze.

• 7:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Really?

• 7:39Speaker 01

  On the verge of sneezing and you feel you're going to lose it, if you're gonna lose your nasal orgasm, stare right at the sun.

• 7:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Lose your nasal orgasm?

• 7:46Speaker 01

  Sneezes.

• 7:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A nasal orgasm?

• 7:48Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 7:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I had not heard that.

• 7:49Speaker 01

  How great do you feel after a sneeze? And then like a little guilty.

• 7:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's good. No, no, but you have to watch out because there are things you feel good after only because the act of leading up to it made you feel bad.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  Oh, that's interesting.

• 8:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 8:00Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 8:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Like you have to pee real bad and then you peeing feels good? Well, it only feels good because you felt miserable right up to that moment. So anything feels.

• 8:07Speaker 01

  You're getting back to homeostasis.

• 8:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Exactly. So I'd, I'd had a lot of syllables in that word. Yeah.

• 8:12Speaker 01

  Uh, I know a lot.

• 8:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's good.

• 8:14Speaker 01

  Why I was, I was, I was asked here. Beg NASA.

• 8:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We did our homework.

• 8:19Speaker 01

  We did me after this guy.

• 8:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so you need air molecules, some kind of gaseous molecules to, and so that always had me wondering in space suits, if they're not properly ventilated, you could just smell yourself.

• 8:32Speaker 01

  You could die.

• 8:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  While you're in a space, well, provided it doesn't swap out your CO2.

• 8:36Speaker 01

  Right.

• 8:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 8:38Speaker 01

  You smell enough farts together.

• 8:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, you could, if you farted, I don't, I don't know if the space, I should ask one of our astronauts, we have some.

• 8:42Speaker 01

  I won't answer you back at NASA.

• 8:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, just ask if like below your waist effluences mix with above your waist effluences, like do burps and farts mix, if that's the case, you'll smell your, all of your body effluences, but I bet they have.

• 8:55Speaker 01

  As long as it's mine, I don't care.

• 8:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Somebody else.

• 8:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay, um, let me find a go on.

• 9:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's true, people have a much higher tolerance of their own gaseous effluences than that of others.

• 9:06Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 9:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Somebody needs to look into that.

• 9:08Speaker 01

  I can, I think I know why.

• 9:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Why?

• 9:10Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 9:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All theories, all hypotheses entertained, go.

• 9:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, um, so, okay, here's what I think, uh, all hypotheses considered, except for just mine, uh, so when you smell something, like we're trained to, if you smell like a fart or poop, like you know that it smells bad, like in our brains, because it's telling us that it's dead and it's not something that we should eat.

• 9:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, you shouldn't eat it, yes.

• 9:31Speaker 01

  I think if it's coming out of yourself somehow, like there's a disconnect where it, because it's from you, maybe kinda like if your own baby is ugly, you don't see it as ugly.

• 9:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 9:40Speaker 01

  And when it comes from us, we're not as grossed out.

• 9:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we're psychologically predisposed.

• 9:43Speaker 01

  Narcissist, and that.

• 9:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  To not completely reject.

• 9:46Speaker 01

  Right?

• 9:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, alright.

• 9:48Speaker 01

  That's gotta be somewhere.

• 9:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright.

• 9:50Speaker 01

  On the spectrum, right?

• 9:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We got top people we can put on this.

• 9:52Speaker 01

  Okay, I haven't seen any so far. Two producers, one's eating her lunch in there. And there's my managers over here.

• 9:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright.

• 9:59Speaker 01

  Okay, here we go, um.

• 10:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Your dog is on the floor there, looking forlorningly at you.

• 10:02Speaker 01

  Just looking for answers.

• 10:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 10:04Speaker 01

  From you.

• 10:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Aren't we all, looking for answers?

• 10:06Speaker 01

  That's why I came here.

• 10:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 10:08Speaker 01

  The smartest person in a 12 block radius. Okay, I'm just gonna read you a long one.

• 10:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm, go.

• 10:12Speaker 01

  Sarah Nguyen Belgeni from Facebook says, "Do you think that spacecraft using photon propulsion is a reality? I read several news articles stating we can use a laser," she wrote "laser," "to propel spacecraft to Alpha Centauri in just 15 years and to Mars in just days. Is this the same concept as a light sail?"

• 10:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It is precisely the same concept.

• 10:34Speaker 01

  Great, next question.

• 10:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Next question. Yeah, so you have your sail and you have lasers on Earth. Well, so here's what happens. So your sail can work with the sun, with sunlight. And it can move you to greater and greater orbits and you can move to Mars or wherever else. And it's a constant source of acceleration. So this works. And if you keep accelerating, the speed that you measure for yourself is constantly growing.

• 10:56Speaker 01

  Is the sail like a solar panel?

• 10:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a, no, not a solar panel. A solar panel takes the sun's energy, sunlight and turns it into energy you'd use for something else. This is simply a sail. You hold up the sail, sunlight hits the sail and bounces off and the recoil, the momentum transfer to the sail pushes you forward. That's all it is. But now what happens if you're so far away from the sun that the sun's energy, they're not strong enough? So you take mondo lasers from Earth, aim it at the sail and continue to push it along its way. And lasers can go very, very deep into space. Yes.

• 11:28Speaker 01

  But not into a...

• 11:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, you can go into a black hole but not come out.

• 11:32Speaker 01

  Not come out.

• 11:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, exactly.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  That's the right answer. Okay, here's one, because I recognize these words from science class.

• 11:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 11:37Speaker 01

  Uh, pulsars, quasars, magnetars, neutron stars, white dwarfs, black holes. Are all of them simply dying stars?

• 11:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes. Next question.

• 11:45Speaker 01

  I'm gonna look through these.

• 11:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, they're all different. Wait, wait, go back. Wait, wait, wait. Okay, uh, give me the list again. So is white dwarfs on that list?

• 11:55Speaker 01

  She is on the list.

• 11:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, the sun, when it dies...

• 11:59Speaker 01

  They're white little people.

• 12:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, is that really? Yeah, okay.

• 12:01Speaker 01

  And we don't say black holes, we say African-American.

• 12:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, yeah, you're right.

• 12:04Speaker 01

  I'm just trying to make...

• 12:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, that's right. So...

• 12:08Speaker 01

  I'm gonna get you a better question. Everyone knows they're dying stars.

• 12:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, did you hear about the greeting card that talked about black holes? And someone thought they were talking about black hoes? And, and like the NAACP got all enraged by this?

• 12:21Speaker 01

  No one do the research?

• 12:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No.

• 12:23Speaker 01

  Someone looked at the card and it was like, "This is an L."

• 12:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If black hole and other physics concepts are not in your vocabulary?

• 12:29Speaker 01

  Right.

• 12:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You have no other way to think about... Black hole, other than black hoe.

• 12:34Speaker 01

  I mean, that's-

• 12:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just saying, I, I, I try, I try to jump in and say, this is an education problem, not a racist problem.

• 12:41Speaker 01

  It is a huge, which sometimes they go one and-

• 12:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's an, it's an, it's a non-

• 12:45Speaker 01

  Education problem.

• 12:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But so, all of these are, are the dying states of stars. Stars of different mass, and are we, we, our sun will die as a white dwarf, which is a, a, an object the size of the earth, and all the rest of the mass of the sun will be, uh, will escape into space and make a beautiful nebula, which we call a, well, they're called, actually called planetary nebula, it's, they're misnamed, but they're beautiful, spherically shaped nebulae. And you look, you look, if you Google planetary, now, you know, that's a galaxy. Uh, but, but planetary nebula are just gorgeous, stunning displays.

• 13:19Speaker 01

  Are those the ones that look like, looks like cotton candy almost?

• 13:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah!

• 13:23Speaker 01

  Crab Nebula, that's one.

• 13:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, Crab Nebula was the death of a supernova, which leaves a neutron star, a pulsar in its core. So the Crab Nebula has a, you, you go down to the center of the Crab Nebula, there is a rapidly rotating neutron star pulsing radio waves. And when these puppies were first discovered, we thought they were, they were so perfectly timed, that people thought that maybe there was an intelligent civilization sending us signals.

• 13:46Speaker 01

  You're saying, you probably can't close to it, because if it's a radio wave-

• 13:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, well, if, if it's too intense, it's bad for you, but we're at enough, good enough distance, so our radio telescopes detected it. But no, they were not LGMs, Little Green Men, which is how they were first written.

• 13:57Speaker 01

  LGM?

• 13:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, someone says, is this an LGM or not?

• 14:00Speaker 01

  I like how they're labeled green before we even saw them.

• 14:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, plus, plus, we want them to be small, so that we can dominate them.

• 14:06Speaker 01

  Well, yeah, how do you think we're gonna progress? Question.

• 14:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, no one ever imagines, uh, BGMs, you know, big green men.

• 14:12Speaker 01

  Uh, yeah, they're probably not big, I would imagine aliens might be taller than us, but not heavier.

• 14:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As they were in Avatar, they were nine feet tall.

• 14:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, which is a bible. That's, that's rote, that's a rhetoric, that's good, perfect, that's, you gotta, that's how it's gonna be.

• 14:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's what, that's what's gonna go.

• 14:26Speaker 01

  For sure.

• 14:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 14:27Speaker 01

  These are always right, eventually.

• 14:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Blue people.

• 14:31Speaker 01

  They could be blue.

• 14:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know what pissed me off about that movie?

• 14:33Speaker 01

  What?

• 14:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, they're all connected, but they got this USB ponytail, the way they can connect to their, to their flying horses, and all of nature is one, when it was time for them to fight.

• 14:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, the best that could happen was the, the rhinoceroses came, and that was it. I'm thinking, if you could summon all the power of all the living creatures on your planet, oh my gosh.

• 14:56Speaker 01

  Okay, but if like everything-

• 14:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The tree would come and swat you, oh my, if you had the, if you could talk to them through your ponytail?

• 15:02Speaker 01

  Right.

• 15:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, excuse me, they, they should have totally kicked ass.

• 15:06Speaker 01

  They're about like intercranial Bluetooth capabilities, like I can't even get my phone to connect to my Civic.

• 15:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just saying-

• 15:12Speaker 01

  I can harness any other armies.

• 15:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just saying, they had way more powerful, power that they could have tapped, given the premise of that story.

• 15:19Speaker 01

  Right.

• 15:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Than they actually did.

• 15:21Speaker 01

  Maybe the message is like when it comes times to, comes time to war, maybe less is more.

• 15:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And all they, they end up there praying and stuff, and I'm thinking, you have the power over nature, put nature to work here.

• 15:29Speaker 01

  Right.

• 15:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know?

• 15:30Speaker 01

  But nature, what can nature do for you?

• 15:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 15:33Speaker 01

  When you run for president-

• 15:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What have you done for me lately?

• 15:35Speaker 01

  What have you done for me lately, nature? Thanks for all the shade, jerks. What, this is a question, what would be on, because you said our son's gonna die?

• 15:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, son is totally gonna die.

• 15:43Speaker 01

  What would be on our son's tombstone?

• 15:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Um.

• 15:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I burned, I burned the candle at both ends.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  Oh, I like that.

• 15:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, how about that?

• 15:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're listening to StarTalk. Stay tuned for another segment.

• 16:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Welcome back to StarTalk. Here's more of this week's episode.

• 16:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Before we left off, you challenged me to come up with a, a, an epitaph for the dead son.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 16:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I, and I said, I, I burned my candles at both ends, and that was a little lame, I think, and I'm, I want another chance.

• 16:33Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 16:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Do you have one?

• 16:34Speaker 01

  I have one.

• 16:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, ready, okay, what?

• 16:36Speaker 01

  The epitaph on the son's tombstone should be, sick burn, bro.

• 16:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh, ooh.

• 16:42Speaker 01

  Everyone hates me?

• 16:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, alright, alright, alright.

• 16:45Speaker 01

  Okay, let's.

• 16:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, I got one, okay. Uh, this has spoken to Earthlings who long went extinct.

• 16:53Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 16:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I tried.

• 16:55Speaker 01

  Oh, that's so sad.

• 16:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 16:58Speaker 01

  What about, "I couldn't take the heat."

• 16:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh!

• 17:03Speaker 01

  This skill applies literally to no other avenue in my life.

• 17:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's right.

• 17:07Speaker 01

  Uh, yes.

• 17:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Celestial. The sun, okay.

• 17:10Speaker 01

  Um, you had one question that I felt I could answer, in one answer.

• 17:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Really? Okay, go, go. That gives me one fewer that I gotta answer. Go.

• 17:17Speaker 01

  Corey Moon, at SF Moon.

• 17:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Someone named Moon?

• 17:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Love it. What phase is he?

• 17:22Speaker 01

  Uh, full.

• 17:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Good.

• 17:24Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 17:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 17:25Speaker 01

  I don't know any other moons. A blood moon, a harvest moon.

• 17:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Harvest moon.

• 17:29Speaker 01

  Blood moon. What kinda sicko came up with that one?

• 17:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Maybe he's, uh, amber and he's a honeymoon.

• 17:35Speaker 01

  Is that a thing?

• 17:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, honeymoon is the.

• 17:37Speaker 01

  Honeymoon, sorry.

• 17:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The June full moon.

• 17:38Speaker 01

  I'm so focused on not sounding like an idiot, then I'm like, "A honeymoon, great. It's a celestial reference."

• 17:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The June, uh, full moon is the honeymoon.

• 17:47Speaker 01

  Okay, so you're not.

• 17:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Many people don't know it, but it is. And that's how you get honeymoon.

• 17:50Speaker 01

  The one that most men try to avoid being.

• 17:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Possibly, but, but I wonder if, if June was not the traditional marriage month, then what would the vacation you take after wedding be called? If you named it after those moons.

• 18:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It'd have very different sets of, sets of names.

• 18:04Speaker 01

  That's why it's got the word honeymoon.

• 18:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, there's a wolf moon, there's a snow moon, there's a.

• 18:08Speaker 01

  Snow moon?

• 18:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Snow moon. Uh, well, it's in the, it's a winter moon. There are a lot of cultural references to moons. Uh, and the honeymoon is so named because its arc across the sky remains very low.

• 18:19Speaker 01

  Interesting.

• 18:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it, and it retains the colors of sunset its entire path.

• 18:23Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 18:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Which is a deep amber. And so, it has an amber color even at its brightest. And so, it's a honeymoon.

• 18:29Speaker 01

  As opposed to the harvest moon?

• 18:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  By far, correct.

• 18:31Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 18:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct.

• 18:32Speaker 01

  All right.

• 18:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So what do you have?

• 18:34Speaker 01

  Uh.

• 18:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Take me there. Cosmic queries.

• 18:36Speaker 01

  He asks, "Has a nuclear bomb ever been tested in space? If so, what happened? Please visit Utah." And my answer is, "Yeah, that's Utah." That's how we got Utah. Terrible.

• 18:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, so, uh, so we have never tested a nuclear bomb in space.

• 18:54Speaker 01

  Chinese and the Russians.

• 18:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, but the sun is a nuclear bomb.

• 19:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Therefore, it is being tested in space continually.

• 19:04Speaker 01

  As we speak.

• 19:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  By all stars throughout the galaxy and the universe.

• 19:07Speaker 01

  Maybe his epitaph, the ex-sun's epitaph will be testing, one, two, and then nothing else.

• 19:13Speaker 01

  Testing fail.

• 19:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What happens if I put these molecules, these atoms together?

• 19:16Speaker 01

  What does, what do these two wires do?

• 19:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So the difference is, when we, when we create thermonuclear fusion, it is uncontrolled and it's a bomb. When the sun creates thermonuclear fusion, it's controlled and it's a star. So that's the difference. We don't know how to control it.

• 19:29Speaker 01

  How come when you do it, it's a star, but when I do it, it's a bomb? It sounds like an argument.

• 19:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 19:34Speaker 01

  Sounds like a teenage galaxy arguing with the sun. How come when you do it?

• 19:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That would be the sun's, that would be a badass argument.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  Son of the sun.

• 19:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Sun could invoke that argument. Now, now, the two times nuclear weapons have ever been used in warfare, they were detonated in the air, not on the ground.

• 19:52Speaker 01

  Really?

• 19:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 19:53Speaker 01

  I didn't know that.

• 19:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, and that is the birth of the concept of ground zero. It is the spot on the ground beneath the location of the explosion.

• 20:02Speaker 01

  Okay, well, that's.

• 20:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Which is the.

• 20:03Speaker 01

  I was thinking about.

• 20:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Closest point. And there are people who like calculate this. How do you maximize the blast radius to kill and damage the most?

• 20:11Speaker 01

  You know exactly how much the radius is.

• 20:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so you, so you figure out how, what is the rate that this would grow? How much damage will it have? How much energy does it have? Therefore, what is the altitude? It was about a kilometer up. So that was detonated in the air. Then there were nuclear test ban treaties that came out, and one of them said you can't do it on earth's surface, so then they did it underground.

• 20:29Speaker 01

  Can't do it on earth's surface.

• 20:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, then they would scatter radioactive materials, right? So if you do it underground, then all the radioactive stays underground.

• 20:36Speaker 01

  In the soil.

• 20:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In the soil, in that one spot. So you pick a spot where nobody lives and you do it there. Then they were banned entirely, and so.

• 20:44Speaker 01

  There's, there's gotta be like half-lives or something. It can't just be like contained, like it, there's, for sure.

• 20:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, but it's hard. It's very hard for radioactivity to penetrate through soil. It's very hard.

• 20:53Speaker 01

  No. No way. Porus at best.

• 20:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, but there are a lot of really, really empty places on earth.

• 21:02Speaker 01

  Utah. At home of the new, of NASA's proud new, I know NASA doesn't do radioactive nuclear testing, but, but maybe one day. Back to the question.

• 21:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Utah. All right.

• 21:12Speaker 01

  Utah.

• 21:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What else you have? This is, this, by the way, this is Cosmic Query's grab bag, so whatever, you know.

• 21:18Speaker 01

  Cosmic Query's grab bag, okay. Lou Nukem, at Lou Nukem.

• 21:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Nukem as in N-U-K-E-M?

• 21:25Speaker 01

  N-E-W-C-O-M-B.

• 21:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We were just talking about nukes. I'm sorry, I have nukes on the brain.

• 21:30Speaker 01

  Sure. Uh, so it's apropos. Uh, is active, I mean, it's not SETI, it's S-E-T-I?

• 21:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  SETI, you can pronounce it, yeah.

• 21:36Speaker 01

  We pronounce it, we say the acronyms here.

• 21:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  SETI.

• 21:39Speaker 01

  Is active SETI a good idea? Do you agree with Dr. Hawking that it could be risky?

• 21:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes. Well, well, so I don't, okay, so SETI, we're searching for life in the universe. Fine.

• 21:48Speaker 01

  That's the acronym?

• 21:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence.

• 21:51Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 21:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, okay. You didn't know what that stood for?

• 21:53Speaker 01

  Nope.

• 21:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Everybody knows what it-

• 21:55Speaker 01

  No way. Makeup artist, PR person, manager, dog on the floor?

• 21:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  SETI, dog, uh, Blanche, right?

• 22:01Speaker 01

  Blanche, did you know SETI?

• 22:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, she knew it. Yeah, she-

• 22:05Speaker 01

  I don't know, why does it have to have an acronym? Just-

• 22:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, well, 'cause it's, it's easier. So, here's the thing. So, we are looking for life. Now, the two ways of engaging SETI, one of them is-

• 22:15Speaker 01

  Looking for life in all the wrong places?

• 22:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We turn, we turn our telescopes and aim it at places and just see if anyone's trying to talk to us. All right? That's one way we're looking for life. That's actually pretty safe. Because if we find life, they have no idea where we are. Unless, we send signals. So Hawking is concerned that if we start sending signals, announcing where we are in the-

• 22:40Speaker 01

  Position, yeah.

• 22:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Out of location and, and, and what we're saying, then maybe we would be prime, prime candidates for being enslaved or, or taken over, or whatever. So he's worried that it's a bad idea to announce our presence, but in fact, there's not a damn thing we can do about it because we already have. And for the past 80 years, our radio signals and our, and our television signals have been leaking out from our atmosphere. When they talk about being on the air, the air has nothing to do with it. Radio signals move through the dead of space like it's nobody's business.

• 23:16Speaker 01

  And soil. They go through soil.

• 23:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A certain depth of soil. The radio waves can go through a certain depth.

• 23:21Speaker 01

  At Home Depot, they have a special.

• 23:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, they penetrate through walls and buildings. That's why.

• 23:25Speaker 01

  It's going out anyway.

• 23:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's going out anyway. So the earliest signs that of life on Earth have already been established.

• 23:32Speaker 01

  And they're traveling through space.

• 23:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  At the speed of light.

• 23:35Speaker 01

  At the speed of light.

• 23:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  At the speed of light.

• 23:36Speaker 01

  Billions of light years away at this point.

• 23:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, no, no, no, only.

• 23:39Speaker 01

  Nope, it's billions.

• 23:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Eighty light years.

• 23:41Speaker 01

  Okay. Ready to disagree? Put your hand on mine. They've gone so far.

• 23:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I will agree to say you're wrong. Right.

• 23:47Speaker 01

  Okay, that's not what I asked.

• 23:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So eighty years ago is when they began. So how far away can they possibly be by now?

• 23:53Speaker 01

  You tell me.

• 23:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Eighty light years.

• 23:54Speaker 01

  Eighty light years.

• 23:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, because they're traveling the speed of light.

• 23:56Speaker 01

  Okay, but eighty light years in regular years is how many years?

• 24:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Eighty years.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  That's it? Why label it a light year for the same thing?

• 24:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, no, because it's been going for eighty years to travel eighty light years. Now, if you want to say billions, so eighty times five point eight trillion is how many miles away.

• 24:15Speaker 01

  I meant miles. I said years.

• 24:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so eighty times five point eight trillion. So it's eight times six, so it's forty eight, so it's five. Yeah.

• 24:25Speaker 01

  Four hundred.

• 24:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 24:26Speaker 01

  I'm gonna let you figure it out. I'm gonna let you say it. I don't want to embarrass you.

• 24:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so eighty, so it'll be four hundred trillion.

• 24:31Speaker 01

  I was close with the four.

• 24:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, four hundred trillion miles.

• 24:33Speaker 01

  Times five is forty.

• 24:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Very good.

• 24:36Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 24:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So.

• 24:38Speaker 01

  I'll get five at my high school. As far. But the point is it's going out when we couldn't control it.

• 24:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All I'm saying is it has washed over exo-planets that may have some kind of life, possibly intelligent life. And if they have the tools to detect our signals, they will infer what our culture was like. And I've said this many times before on the show, and we just have to suck it up that their first encounters will be things like the honeymooners.

• 25:04Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 25:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And they'll learn how.

• 25:05Speaker 01

  The moon, Alice. We know where the moon is.

• 25:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, they'll learn how men and women treat one another from seeing the honeymooner.

• 25:11Speaker 01

  Everyone's, all the men are fat and all the women stay at home.

• 25:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, and the men threaten bodily harm.

• 25:16Speaker 01

  Harm to their wives.

• 25:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, right.

• 25:18Speaker 01

  Uh.

• 25:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Bang zoom to the moon, Alice.

• 25:20Speaker 01

  But isn't that funny that it's-

• 25:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And why I oughta, you know?

• 25:23Speaker 01

  Well, I think it's also where, there's so many variables to that. We're assuming that if it's intelligent life, it's more intelligent than us. And it's understanding, like, there's so many, it's so, such a small equation that would be they're smarter than us and know what we're doing and are war mongering people.

• 25:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And, uh, right, so, so, uh, the reason why-

• 25:38Speaker 01

  We're looking for us.

• 25:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The reason why I don't agree with Hawking, because that's what started this.

• 25:41Speaker 01

  I don't-

• 25:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Hawking is, feels they might have, uh, evil motives.

• 25:46Speaker 01

  Right.

• 25:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I claim, and, and by the way, if they come visit us in response to our signal, they are far more advanced than we are. Because we're still just driving around the block, uh, boldly going where hundreds have gone before in low earth orbit. So, we haven't even been anywhere in forty years and it don't look like we're going anywhere anytime soon.

• 26:04Speaker 01

  Right.

• 26:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, if they come here, they're more advanced than us. So, he's worried that a more advanced civilization coming upon earth might then enslave us. And I'm saying that while that may be true, his fear derives not from-

• 26:18Speaker 01

  Scientific evidence from movies.

• 26:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He is, hi- hi- his fear comes from what he thinks aliens will do, but he's basing that on what he knows humans will do.

• 26:30Speaker 01

  Sure. What else could you base it off of?

• 26:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is-

• 26:33Speaker 01

  Our own behavior.

• 26:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He's, so, he's assuming that aliens are as evil and as war mongering as humans.

• 26:40Speaker 01

  He also read Guardians of the Galaxy.

• 26:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 26:42Speaker 01

  Before it became a movie. Uh, but yeah, it's, it's an assumption and, uh, it's all-

• 26:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, maybe aliens are better than us in every way that matters.

• 26:51Speaker 01

  Can I, my theory that I said during the break?

• 26:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What's that?

• 26:54Speaker 01

  Was that aliens are an advanced form of humans visiting us from the future.

• 26:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, okay.

• 26:59Speaker 01

  Look at, their brains are bigger.

• 27:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright.

• 27:01Speaker 01

  Eyes are bigger, which are things you would need. You don't have to use like a nice eyeliner.

• 27:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, alright, alright, yeah.

• 27:06Speaker 01

  They don't have hair, we don't really need hair. They don't have, uh, sex organs presented, which is kind of an animalistic thing.

• 27:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 27:13Speaker 01

  Um, and they're, they seem to be very smart.

• 27:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How do they mate? I mean, how do they know who to mate?

• 27:17Speaker 01

  E.T., like that.

• 27:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 27:20Speaker 01

  I don't know. I don't know what I'm up to.

• 27:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're coming up with the theme, listening to your ideas.

• 27:23Speaker 01

  You could still have sex organs like fish don't have boobs.

• 27:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Not that you notice, but I bet to fish, it's totally happening.

• 27:29Speaker 01

  If she dressed nice for me once in a while, I would pay attention to her. Uh, they have sex like aliens do. Remember the.

• 27:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Animals have no problems finding out who to, who to mate. All right.

• 27:38Speaker 01

  Okay, so the aliens, it'll just.

• 27:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Even though we need a lesson, oh, which is the male snake and which is the female snake? They don't have any problems.

• 27:44Speaker 01

  So neither do the aliens. So put your elbow to mine. I don't know what they do. Something gross that involves boobs, obviously.

• 27:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Elbow sex.

• 27:51Speaker 01

  Elbow sex. All right. Here's another.

• 27:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What else you got?

• 27:53Speaker 01

  Okay. Tim Wall at Tim Wall 2016. So we just got that handle. Uh, if an astronaut jumped.

• 28:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or he was just born this year.

• 28:02Speaker 01

  He's a brilliant, then you know what?

• 28:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  People tend to put their, their birth year in their handles. Go on.

• 28:07Speaker 01

  If an astronaut jumped on a diving board on the moon, would he bounce higher or lower than on earth? I know the answer to this.

• 28:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. He, uh, so the, the diving, oh, you know the answer. Well, let's hear it.

• 28:20Speaker 01

  Not gonna bounce. There's no gravity.

• 28:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  On the moon?

• 28:23Speaker 01

  He's gonna go high. He's gonna go so high.

• 28:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. There is gravity on the moon. Otherwise, the astronauts would just been floating there rather than walking. Weren't they, they were walking.

• 28:31Speaker 01

  Yep, there's gravity on the moon.

• 28:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. Just, just think that one through. Yeah, you go higher. Yeah.

• 28:35Speaker 01

  Cause I knew that.

• 28:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. So, well, well, no, no. So, so just, just to be clear, the, the, so one of them is you're trying to set mass into motion. Okay. And your mass is your mass no matter where you are. But for a given amount of recoil, that same recoil will then send something farther on the moon than it would otherwise here on earth. So that's why on the moon, when they hopped, they hopped very far than they did here on earth.

• 29:02Speaker 01

  That's great.

• 29:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Even though they had 200 pounds worth of, of, or more of, of, of life support. Because 200 pounds, they weigh one sixth. So 200 pounds would weigh only how much?

• 29:13Speaker 01

  Half of one six, what'd you say?

• 29:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, so, no, so on the moon, it's one-sixth gravity.

• 29:18Speaker 01

  You're trying to suck my chin in like I was understanding.

• 29:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's good. So, on moon is one-sixth gravity? So, the 200-pound thing on Earth would weigh one-sixth, that's six of that on the moon. Yeah.

• 29:28Speaker 01

  No one can, I can't do that. A half, a half of it.

• 29:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'll put you on the spot. I'll put you on the spot.

• 29:31Speaker 01

  No.

• 29:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You make up for the fact that you said it had no gravity at all. That was your way to...

• 29:35Speaker 01

  That was just me getting nervous about interplanetary discussions with a renowned astrophysicist.

• 29:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so, so it's less gravity, and you can do a lot of fun things. You can like, baseball games would be really interesting, and...

• 29:47Speaker 01

  Okay, here's what I...

• 29:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You couldn't throw a curveball because you need air to, to, to move it against.

• 29:51Speaker 01

  That's what I do know.

• 29:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You don't.

• 29:52Speaker 01

  If you go into space and you jumped, if, if you were out of an orbit and you jumped in outer space off a diving board, you would just continue, you wouldn't even...

• 29:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct.

• 30:00Speaker 01

  Because, objects in motion tend to stay in motion, Sir Isaac Newton.

• 30:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes. Give it up for Eliza!

• 30:08Speaker 01

  Like, in your head, you were like, "Please don't say her name wrong."

• 30:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I know.

• 30:11Speaker 01

  Right?

• 30:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, very good. So, you had physics.

• 30:14Speaker 01

  Was.

• 30:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You took physics. Why didn't you take physics?

• 30:16Speaker 01

  Long to, like, long, no, long ago...

• 30:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You remembered that. Good.

• 30:18Speaker 01

  Long ago, long ago enough that I could have forgotten it. But I have a profound respect for physics.

• 30:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Good. As we all should, because these are, these are not just good ideas, they're the laws.

• 30:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, they're the laws. Sometimes at home, I have a very small counter, and I drop my things off my, like, makeup counter.

• 30:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 30:35Speaker 01

  Every time something falls, I yell, "Gravity!"

• 30:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes!

• 30:37Speaker 01

  Angry. Okay.

• 30:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What's next?

• 30:40Speaker 01

  Please stop. I'm just with the questions. Uh, Bobby Tenderflake. That is the cutest last name. Bobby Tenderflake.

• 30:51Speaker 01

  It sounds like a southern, like, "Come here, little tenderflake."

• 30:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 30:55Speaker 01

  Bobby Tenderflake, which is either a porn name, or you're very close to nature.

• 30:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know, uh, let me tell you my porn name?

• 31:01Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 31:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's, uh, Tuffy Arlington.

• 31:04Speaker 01

  Why?

• 31:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 31:05Speaker 01

  Is it, is it one, like, you, the, the street you grew up on?

• 31:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, and they're down your first pad. Yeah, yeah.

• 31:09Speaker 01

  I think it's gotta be more cosmos-related.

• 31:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, what can I do? That's what strikes. I can't choose what street I grew up on. I did just, Tuffy Arlington.

• 31:16Speaker 01

  You get to another level.

• 31:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But then I have to invent one.

• 31:18Speaker 01

  I'll tell you how to do it. I'll tell you the formula. It's your favorite nebula, and, uh, your favorite subatomic particle.

• 31:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, that would be the crab boson.

• 31:29Speaker 01

  There you go. Sounds like a disease and we'll move on. Mine would be...

• 31:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You've got crab bosons, huh?

• 31:36Speaker 01

  I would have to say crab, because it's the only nebula I know.

• 31:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There's an ointment for that. The crab boson.

• 31:41Speaker 01

  There's an ointment for that. Bobby Tenderflake, at heavy sweating. Well, there's your porn name right there.

• 31:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, alright, alright.

• 31:48Speaker 01

  At heavy sweating.

• 31:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We've got like 20 seconds in this segment. Go.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  If I went to pee on Pluto, would the pee freeze before it hit the ground?

• 31:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, it would!

• 31:55Speaker 01

  Great.

• 31:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It would, you'd make a pee arc. Yes, and then you would die, because there's no air for you to breathe.

• 32:01Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 32:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And you would freeze too.

• 32:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, you just got your [bleep] out.

• 32:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, and by the way, you don't have to do that on, there are plenty of other places in the solar system, you can pee and have it freeze in midstream.

• 32:10Speaker 01

  It's a man question. I'm going to mark my territory like an American.

• 32:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I could do that on Pluto, can I still do it?

• 32:16Speaker 01

  Can I make a pee spear? It would arc. You're saying it would arc?

• 32:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, because that's just the trajectory of it.

• 32:21Speaker 01

  Wouldn't freeze before it got to that trajectory?

• 32:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It wouldn't matter, it would still follow the arc.

• 32:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're listening to StarTalk Radio. Stay tuned. More up next.

• 32:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Welcome back. Here's more of StarTalk.

• 32:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so, give it to me.

• 32:52Speaker 01

  Question for you is...

• 32:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  See how many we can fit in. Go.

• 32:56Speaker 01

  More Emily Care Boss, at Emily Care. I don't understand what that beginning is. So it's at Emily Care.

• 33:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 33:02Speaker 01

  Which is an old age home for only women named Emily. What are the, what are the frontiers of research in astrophysics right now?

• 33:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, right now, we're looking for dark matter. We don't know what is causing 85% of the gravity of the universe. We don't know what is making the, yeah, yeah. I'm not even done, right? And there's a pressure in the vacuum of space, making the universe accelerate.

• 33:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In its expansion against the wishes of all the of all the galaxies that it contains. If you had a dark matter and dark energy, it is ninety-six percent of all that is driving the universe, and we haven't a clue what they are.

• 33:37Speaker 01

  Dark side is winning. It's Star Wars.

• 33:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The dark side is definitely winning, winning this contest of knowledge.

• 33:43Speaker 01

  Something's out there just pulling.

• 33:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, and we don't know what it is, but we can measure it.

• 33:46Speaker 01

  What does that have to do with, uh?

• 33:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We don't know. I don't know. I don't know. We shouldn't even, I've said, we shouldn't even call it dark matter, dark energy. That implies we know it's matter and energy. We don't even know what the hell it is.

• 33:55Speaker 01

  It's evil, though.

• 33:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's

• 33:57Speaker 01

  We know it's evil, and it's out there, and it's pulling.

• 33:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because it's dark.

• 34:01Speaker 01

  Creating stretch marks on the universe.

• 34:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Those are two, and we're looking for life in the universe, uh, life on Mars, life in Europa.

• 34:06Speaker 01

  And hawking is like, no.

• 34:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This could be probably microbial. I don't think there's intelligent life lurking in caves on Mars, but, um, life at all would be a boon to biology.

• 34:15Speaker 01

  They find?

• 34:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No.

• 34:16Speaker 01

  Water bits on Mars?

• 34:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, but not intelligent life. That's different. Yeah.

• 34:20Speaker 01

  I think it's a little rude to call them.

• 34:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a jump.

• 34:22Speaker 01

  I think it's

• 34:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a jump to go from

• 34:24Speaker 01

  Oozing water.

• 34:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oozing water to intelligent life with civilizations.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  Well, you haven't been to Hollywood, so your definition of intelligent is not the same as others.

• 34:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so, uh, I would say that, plus, uh, on the bio- biological side, which affects the search for life, we don't know how to turn organic molecules into self-replicating life. That transition with, which Earth did, without any, apparently without any issues.

• 34:45Speaker 01

  Any help.

• 34:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Without any help, um, uh, we, so we don't know how to do that yet. So that's an interesting frontier. Once you figure that out, you can better decide what planet it might be happening on.

• 34:55Speaker 01

  Right.

• 34:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 34:56Speaker 01

  Hey, well.

• 34:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 34:58Speaker 01

  There's your answer.

• 34:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Bring it on.

• 35:00Speaker 01

  Care for only Emilys.

• 35:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 35:02Speaker 01

  Uh, Mike Arm- Armenni, at ArmO15.

• 35:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 35:07Speaker 01

  Which specific sci-fi movie would you like to see remade, because the idea was fine, but the execution was awful?

• 35:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh.

• 35:15Speaker 01

  Some enemies, right here today.

• 35:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh, uh, hmm.

• 35:18Speaker 01

  Remade. My least favorite genre.

• 35:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, I gotta, okay, uh, they, they did The Day the Earth Stood Still a second time, and it was they, they, it was different, but I thought it was, it could have been better, but it was good.

• 35:33Speaker 01

  Tell it to him.

• 35:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It was, it was good. It was good. Uh, The Day the Earth Stood Still, because that was first in, what, the fifties or early sixties, and then the, the next one had, uh, Keanu Reeves, and so, and a few others, Kathy Bates was in it, so, but didn't have

• 35:48Speaker 01

  For a remake.

• 35:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 35:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, how many times are you gonna do it? So, so, I would say, uh, The Blob. I think they should remake The Blob.

• 36:00Speaker 01

  Blob, that's, so that's just, okay, I guess I think sci-fi. I think he was looking for more of like a space movie.

• 36:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, well Blob is an alien that sucks your blood and that was not an actor in a costume.

• 36:10Speaker 01

  What about Invasion of the Body Snatchers? It wasn't done poorly in the first place. I'd like to see a remake.

• 36:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But it was remade.

• 36:16Speaker 01

  A remake of the remake.

• 36:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, yeah, okay.

• 36:18Speaker 01

  No one talks about originals anymore.

• 36:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 36:20Speaker 01

  Are you ready for another one?

• 36:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Go for it.

• 36:21Speaker 01

  What type of music do you listen to the most? Are you inspired by music and/or the arts?

• 36:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm deeply and always, and as long as I can remember, have been inspired by the arts. And my brother's an artist. He attended the High School of Music and Art in New York City. I attended the Bronx High School of Science. So, very geeky, very nerdy. It's everything you think it would be is what it was.

• 36:43Speaker 01

  He's got both sides of the brain covered in that movie.

• 36:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Totally, totally covered. And I grew up with a kid artist who's now an adult artist. So, that kept me sensitized, I think. And so I value what role artists contribute to society. And people say, you know, what value is art to the security of our nation?

• 37:01Speaker 01

  Those are like bankers.

• 37:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, you get people who say that, but the answer is, you know, the fact that we do art makes the country worth defending.

• 37:10Speaker 01

  The fact that we're allowed to create art.

• 37:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 37:13Speaker 01

  Makes it worth defending.

• 37:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, yes. And I listen to almost every genre of music that I can even think of. I like creativity, no matter how it manifests. But if I were to pick one for the desert island disc, or I would say for the space mission, all right?

• 37:30Speaker 01

  Have a Discman on a desert island.

• 37:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, no, so just my playlist for my space mission would be heavily represented in the blues. I'm deeply, yeah, I love the blues. If I'm driving a car at night and the blues comes on the radio, or whatever I'm listening to, I gotta like slow down, go to the right-hand lane.

• 37:48Speaker 01

  Feel it.

• 37:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just feel it.

• 37:50Speaker 01

  Just feel it. Every white girl secretly sing wishes she could sing.

• 37:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Really, sing like that?

• 37:56Speaker 01

  That soul?

• 37:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, you want it, it's got to mean something coming out of you. Like Janis Joplin.

• 38:00Speaker 01

  Right, okay, so you're saying all.

• 38:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  People say, oh, wouldn't she suppose she was more suppose she wasn't so depressed and live longer, she'd be more productive, then she wouldn't have been Janis Joplin.

• 38:09Speaker 01

  She would have been even more depressed. I can't believe this is still happening. I've been saying about it forever.

• 38:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Was she from Dallas or from Texas somewhere?

• 38:15Speaker 01

  I don't know. I don't think from Dallas, otherwise that would have been rammed down our throats. Like year two of Texas history.

• 38:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, what else you have?

• 38:21Speaker 01

  Another one, what is antimatter? Do we have access to it? That question by Andrew Sinclair on Facebook.

• 38:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I wonder if these are people who have labs in their basement and they want to become like.

• 38:32Speaker 01

  How do I get access to it? You need to buy some Sudafed?

• 38:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What is antimatter? How do I get my hands on some? Uh, so as far as we have been able to measure.

• 38:41Speaker 01

  Right.

• 38:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All particles of matter have an exact replica of those particles, except they're made of what we call antimatter.

• 38:50Speaker 01

  A doppelganger.

• 38:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Which if they come together, they will completely annihilate and turn into pure energy. And so the it's and it's not just we discovered it first. It was not science. Science fiction does some stuff first. We did this first.

• 39:03Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright. We came up with antimatter, predicted its existence, discovered it.

• 39:09Speaker 01

  How do you discover it?

• 39:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, so it's the product of other reactions. So you have regular matter, you smash particles apart and in the particle stream you see antimatter. And the antimatter doesn't last very long.

• 39:19Speaker 01

  You see antimatter?

• 39:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, because then it.

• 39:21Speaker 01

  The shadow?

• 39:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, you know, you see its path through it back there, cloud chambers and things. You see the the path that it had traveled.

• 39:28Speaker 01

  What about through soil?

• 39:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're still worried you want to store it.

• 39:31Speaker 01

  Very worried about the nuclear reactions going through soil.

• 39:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So it is real and it would be matter antimatter. Uh, engines would be the most powerful engines, the most efficient engines we would ever know how to make. If you're traveling through space, because you start with matter and then you have pure energy. And if you know your car that you drive? You you said a Civic or you were joking about a Civic? What is it? It's like only 20 or 30% at most of the energy of the gas you put in the engine is going to move your car forward. The rest gets dissipated as heat. That's why your car gets hot when you drive it. Imagine if all that energy went into propel your car. You'd be going 200 miles an hour.

• 40:05Speaker 01

  Harnessing energy.

• 40:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Harnessing energy is all about.

• 40:08Speaker 01

  Expended energy.

• 40:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All about that. Exactly. And if all your if all of your matter becomes energy? You got it. There you go.

• 40:14Speaker 01

  Who do you think will win in the race to harnessing antimatter first? Us or the Russians?

• 40:21Speaker 01

  So maybe talk about

• 40:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You want the Cold War to come back? What?

• 40:24Speaker 01

  Well, I don't think it ever left.

• 40:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, we have more resources than the Ruski's do. So maybe, maybe it's us.

• 40:29Speaker 01

  He said it. Dasvidanya.

• 40:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, let's go to, uh, to a lightning round.

• 40:34Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 40:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Try to get as many questions as I can and I'm gonna answer in sound bites.

• 40:36Speaker 01

  Okay, are you ready?

• 40:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Go.

• 40:38Speaker 01

  Do I say the name of the person?

• 40:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, do, just read fast.

• 40:41Speaker 01

  Okay, what is complete stillness? Would you be slingshotted to the end of time? Would you be ripped completely from existence?

• 40:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If you were completely still?

• 40:50Speaker 01

  What is complete stillness?

• 40:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, complete stillness, as far as I know, would have nothing to do with you traveling through time or being cast out to the edge of existence.

• 40:58Speaker 01

  Also the name of a yoga studio.

• 40:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And, and in fact, nothing is completely still. There are vibrations at all levels and even at all temperatures, including absolute zero.

• 41:06Speaker 01

  That's true.

• 41:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Matter vibrates. Next.

• 41:10Speaker 01

  If there

• 41:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  By the way, it just vibrates more if it's hotter. But even at absolute zero, quantum fluctuations create vibrations in matter.

• 41:17Speaker 01

  At the smallest level.

• 41:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Exactly, go.

• 41:19Speaker 01

  If there was no comet to wipe out the dinosaurs, how much harder would it be for mammals? And eventually intelligent life to thrive? Could we maybe get intelligent dinosaurs?

• 41:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so, great question. So here's the thing, our mammal ancestors were running underfoot to T-Rex. Trying to avoid being consumed as hors d'oeuvres. So if the comet didn't come, the asteroid didn't come, it's not clear, we would have evolved to anything unless we were on a completely separate continent.

• 41:46Speaker 01

  Right.

• 41:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Where the dinosaurs couldn't swim and then eat us. Then it's possible that we could evolve intelligence completely separately while there were major dinosaurs existing on another continent. And then when Columbus sits

• 41:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  and cross continents?

• 42:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 42:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, he would have just gotten eaten. That would have

• 42:03Speaker 01

  They're there with like hats on, like, welcome to your dinner.

• 42:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 42:05Speaker 01

  Ever seen the way an iguana looks at you? Like, it knows something. It's like, it could have been us!

• 42:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Next.

• 42:11Speaker 01

  Alright, um...

• 42:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, so could dinosaurs evolve intelligence? Not likely, their brain cavities didn't look like, yeah, too small. Okay, next.

• 42:19Speaker 01

  Bunch of jerks.

• 42:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm, go.

• 42:20Speaker 01

  Okay. Is Earth gaining mass from space dust and impact rocks or losing mass from evaporating gases and launching space probes? What effects would this have on GPS satellite?

• 42:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Excellent question. So we are gaining three, approximately, anywhere between two and 400 tons of meteor dust a day, which vastly exceeds spacecraft that we send out or lost evaporated particles in the atmosphere. So Earth is gaining mass daily.

• 42:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Consequences, that would be, it is not any worse than an elephant collecting a gnat.

• 42:54Speaker 01

  Wow, is that small?

• 42:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, it's less, it's less than that.

• 42:57Speaker 01

  These questions are more just me trying to, I have no idea what I said when I read it. I'm just trying to look like I know what's going on.

• 43:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, for 20 seconds.

• 43:04Speaker 01

  Okay. Even if we somehow discovered the tech to travel at or faster than light, would passengers of the vehicle survive?

• 43:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, it's not, the issue is not how fast you go, it's what is your acceleration? Acceleration is what kills you. Deceleration is what kills you. Alright, so, in a plane, you're going 600 miles an hour, and you're just fine, sipping tea. That's not, speed doesn't kill you. Speed has never killed you. It's all about acceleration. And I actually wrote a little essay for Motor Trend Magazine on acceleration.

• 43:34Speaker 01

  Who doesn't get that? Who isn't subscribing to Motor Trend Magazine?

• 43:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I said, it's, you know, it's not all about the speed, it's all about the acceleration. Because that's what you feel, and that's the feeling of going fast, whether or not you actually are. That's right. So, no, go as fast as you want, and enjoy.

• 43:50Speaker 01

  Go as fast as you want, from Neil deGrasse Tyson, don't wear a seatbelt, and enjoy your life.

• 43:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's not what I said.

• 43:56Speaker 01

  Pretty sure that's what you just said.

• 43:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Fist bump out of this. Eliza's fleshing, grr.

• 44:00Speaker 01

  No, an issue, huh?

• 44:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. We will look for you on Netflix and on TBS.

• 44:05Speaker 01

  Please do.

• 44:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Coming to a, a, a...

• 44:07Speaker 01

  Galaxy near you!

• 44:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Galaxy near you. A stand-up galaxy near you. Avoid pulsars, they're bad for, they're bad for your health.

• 44:14Speaker 01

  Mark matter.

• 44:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Thanks for listening to StarTalk Radio. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Many thanks to our comedian, our guest, our experts, and I've been your host, Neil deGrasse Tyson. Until next time, I bid you to keep looking up.