Cosmic Queries – Sharks

To celebrate shark week, Neil deGrasse Tyson, comic co-host Jordan Klepper, and shark scientist Jasmin Graham answer your fan-submitted Cosmic Queries about sharks – megalodons, shark attacks, the “science” of Sharknado, and 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.

• 0:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is StarTalk Cosmic Queries Edition. I'm your host Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist. And today's topic is, you know, we had to get there. We had, you know, everybody's got to do it. Everybody's got to like, got to do it. Sharks. We are sharking today. And I've got as my co-host Jordan Klepper. Jordan!

• 0:39Jordan Klepper?

  Neil, excited to be sharking with you.

• 0:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, love you, man.

• 0:42Jordan Klepper?

  Love you, man. This is, we're gonna talk about sharks today. I'm excited.

• 0:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're gonna talk about sharks, but neither you nor I have any expertise in this at all.

• 0:51Jordan Klepper?

  We know nothing about sharks, neither. Between us, we know each other.

• 0:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I just know they have teeth. That's all I need to know. They're big and they're hungry.

• 0:59Jordan Klepper?

  Spoiler alert, you're roding this for me, Neil.

• 1:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, well, we've got a special guest, Jasmine Graham. Jasmine, welcome to StarTalk.

• 1:07Speaker 02

  Hello, thanks for having me.

• 1:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so you have, you had, I didn't know you could, you could do this. You're like, you're, you, your degrees are in biology, marine biology, and you specialize in sharks? This is a thing?

• 1:20Speaker 02

  It is a thing. It is a thing.

• 1:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's a thing. And you've got a, uh, you're project coordinator for Mars-Sidlace. Uh, what is that? What is that? Mars-Sidlace? I see Mars, but that's, I don't think that's why, what you got there.

• 1:34Speaker 02

  Not, not that Mars.

• 1:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Not that Mars?

• 1:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mars-Sidlace. That's a whole acronym.

• 1:41Speaker 02

  It is an acronym. It has a long name, Marine Science Laboratory Alliance Center of Excellence. Um, which I spent the first week of my job trying to say without stumbling. But we are a program that's geared towards increasing minority participation in marine science.

• 2:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, cool. And so you're also co-founder of MISs, M-I-S-S, Minorities, Minorities in Shark Science.

• 2:08Speaker 02

  Yes, so, um, that is, is also a program that's, that's geared towards supporting minority students, specifically women of color in shark science. So it's a little more specific than my Mars-Sidlace project, but yes.

• 2:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't mean to sound... You know, narrow, but that's gotta be a hard sell to go up to the hood and say, "Hey, everybody, let's go, let's go find sharks," right? Is this, does that work? Are there, is there enough curiosity? Like, if I'm growing up in the hood, and I'm not thinking about sharks. Do you have to overcome that?

• 2:43Speaker 02

  So, to some extent, so, so I think what happens for a lot of people is they bring up this idea of sharks in the ocean at first, and then people in their community are like, "What?"

• 2:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What?

• 2:56Speaker 02

  And then they feel self-conscious, and they're like, I mean, whenever I told my family I was gonna go study sharks, they're like, "What?"

• 3:05Speaker 02

  You're gonna get it, because they don't even get in the ocean. They fish, but, I mean, they fish to eat. They're not trying to play around with them and figure out what they're doing. So I think the first time that I asked, like, "What do fish do when they're now on our plate?", people were like, "Who cares?"

• 3:20Speaker 02

  I'm like, "I have questions."

• 3:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, if you're gonna be tasty, I don't need to know what you do in the ocean.

• 3:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow, so, very cool. So, so, so, Jordan, you collected questions from our fanbase?

• 3:34Jordan Klepper?

  Got plenty. People are excited, talking about sharks.

• 3:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know, and so sharks spilled over out of the other places into StarTalk. We had to go there. All right, so, Jordan, give it to me. What do you have?

• 3:45Jordan Klepper?

  Let's jump right in with Bike and Bird Patreon subscriber. He's got a question. "How affected, if at all, will sharks be affected by climate change? At what temperatures do the waters have to stay for them to remain comfortable?"

• 4:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, I love that question.

• 4:01Jordan Klepper?

  Yeah.

• 4:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so what's going on there, Jasmine?

• 4:04Speaker 02

  So, that's a, that's a really great question, and something that a lot of researchers are interested in figuring out. So sharks can't maintain their own body temperature. So unlike us, where we run the same temperature unless we have a fever, they can't do that. So they are greatly affected by their environments. And so... Things like climate change or things that are definitely going to be affecting sharks. We don't know how much. We don't know at what point it becomes something that they can't deal with anymore. As far as what's the ideal temperature, that varies with sharks. So, so some sharks live at, at really cold, I mean, for a shark, cold temperatures. And then some are like in the tropics. So it depends.

• 4:49Speaker 02

  And there's a specific ideal temperature for every species of shark. So researchers are really focused on the individual species and how they're going to be affected. And then another important thing is their habitat. So there's a lot of sharks, especially the small coastal sharks, that depend on things like mangroves and reefs and sea grass. And so when those sharks go away.

• 5:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The little sharks, they just bite off a limb or a few fingers, right? The little sharks.

• 5:18Speaker 02

  The little sharks, the little sharks are just swimming around, living life.

• 5:24Jordan Klepper?

  We, we don't have to have nightmares about the little sharks.

• 5:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's what I'm wondering, I just want to know.

• 5:27Jordan Klepper?

  The big ones we have to worry about.

• 5:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, I just want to know, when do you need the bigger boat, right? So, yeah.

• 5:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, the, the most, most sharks are going to be like so small that you're not even like thinking about them. Um, so they're just swimming around. Of course, the really big ones are the ones that get all the attention, the great whites and the tiger sharks. And they are, they are above average size. Most sharks are just like hanging out at like four or five feet long and they're just chilling. Most of the sharks that you're going to encounter, like going to the beach and stuff like that, you probably have a shark within a hundred yards of you at all times, but it's probably like two feet long.

• 6:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Now you tell me this, but so the, do the little sharks just bite off your finger, that's all?

• 6:12Speaker 02

  The little sharks just like swim around and usually they get scared really easily. So if you make any sort of movement, they're going to be like, oh my goodness, that is a big animal. And I don't know what that is, run away.

• 6:25Jordan Klepper?

  I mean, I'm even afraid, do they, do they brush against your thigh? That frightens me.

• 6:31Speaker 02

  I mean, yes, if you're in their way and they're swimming, yeah, they'll bump into you.

• 6:35Jordan Klepper?

  These stories are frightening. They're all frightening.

• 6:38Speaker 02

  I guarantee you, Jordan, that shark that touched you is freaking out like, oh my God, I touched a thing and I don't know what that is. You're both freaking out. Everybody's freaking out. Just fly to half.

• 6:50Jordan Klepper?

  It sounds like high school. You know, we don't know what the boundaries are. Somebody touches somebody else, you're freaking out internally. It's more about what's going on inside than anywhere else.

• 6:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Jasmine, let me hypothesize something. I didn't know sharks were very sensitive to their environmental temper, you know, the water temperature. So if that's the case, and you have global warming, the water temperatures rise, they might have to swim to a lower depth where it's cooler than they previously had been, and that would change the food available to them. Is this a possible scenario in a climate changed future for sharks?

• 7:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's definitely a possible scenario. And you know, if your prey moves, you gotta move. Like, if you're eating fish and all the fish swim over here and you can't follow them, that's a problem.

• 7:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's the end of you. Yeah, that's right. Right. Darwin fixes that immediately. Right, right. Very cool. All right, Jordan.

• 7:49Jordan Klepper?

  That was actually the, that was the first rough draft of the Jaws screenplay. It doesn't end with a gunshot. It ends with the slow building of temperature change and the inability to regulate body temperature. It was about a seven hour film.

• 8:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And they had to evolve the shark so that it fed at a different depth, right?

• 8:08Jordan Klepper?

  It took a while. It's hard to tell that in any kind of official way. So they're like, you know what? Screw it. Let's have them shoot some kind of canister in his mouth.

• 8:18Jordan Klepper?

  I got a question here from another Patreon subscriber, Brian Flowers. My girlfriend Laura would like to know, with so much of the ocean unexplored, can it be said definitively that the megalodon is extinct when tooth specimens not matching their extinction dates have been found?

• 8:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh, so wait, tell me about the Megalodon. There's a movie, right?

• 8:41Speaker 02

  There is, there is a movie called The Meg, which is a, which is an interesting experience. I knew that we were gonna be in for a wild ride when the poster came out and the Megalodon had like thirteen gill slits. I'm like, I have like twice as many gill slits as this thing should have. But, um, yeah, so a lot of people ask that question.

• 8:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm sure, wait, I'm sure Jordan thought the same thing when he saw the movie poster.

• 9:02Jordan Klepper?

  I was like, you know what, I'm, I'm all in, but this doesn't feel at all. The research said, I'm gone, usually.

• 9:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Authenticity just went out the door.

• 9:11Jordan Klepper?

  Statham is usually so good with authenticity.

• 9:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, so, yeah, the, lots of people ask that of like, well, how do you know? Okay, first of all, they were ginormous, like ginormous. And it's not like they were living in the deep ocean. That, that was not the case. It's not like, oh, they could be down deep in Marianas Trench and we could drill them up accidentally. No, they didn't live that deep. That's not a thing that was happening. Also, the, the biggest way that you can tell is by the size of our whales. So whales are really big now. Whales didn't always used to be big. They used to be small and fast. And the reason why they were small and fast was to avoid being eaten by the Megalodon.

• 9:57Speaker 02

  That was their main, like, defense of getting eaten by a Megalodon was like, all right, this thing is really big. I just gotta be really fast. So they would be really small and really fast. And then Megalodon went extinct and then was the rise of the great white sharks. So now we have a shark that's much smaller and much faster. So then the whales' strategy kind of changed a little bit. So they actually evolved to be so big that it would be a hassle for the great whites to try and eat them. So if they were all super big and slow during the time of Megalodon, they would have 100% gotten taken out. Like, Megalodon would have been like, ah, a sperm whale. This is just a white snack.

• 10:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so, so what you're saying is they weren't bottom dwellers, so that you would see them. You would see them. You can't hide a huge animal.

• 10:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 10:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And their prey would, you, that's interesting, because one way to know about whether an animal exists is whether its prey is rampant in a, in a area. And then you say, well, there can't be that many foxes if you see many rabbits.

• 11:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right? That's a fair, this is a fair, or ecological statement to make.

• 11:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 11:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 11:10Speaker 02

  Things co-evolve together and, and, you know, whenever the thing that they're trying to avoid goes extinct, they're like, woo-hoo, free for all, we can get as big as we want now.

• 11:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, I gotta, I gotta defend the movie one last chance here. So if the megalodon is extinct, and gills are not made of fossilizable tissue, how do you know they didn't have 13 slits?

• 11:33Speaker 02

  So that I...

• 11:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Am I good there, Jordan? Jordan, I think I got it on this.

• 11:37Jordan Klepper?

  Neil, I think this, this is, you, you said, you came into this saying you didn't know about sharks, but you were making some...

• 11:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is a slowdown. Okay, yeah, go on.

• 11:45Speaker 02

  So gill arches fossilize, so, so cartilage doesn't fossilize nearly as well as bone, but, you know, cartilage does fossilize. And, and we have a lot of scientists, not me, this is not my field of expertise, but a lot of scientists do a lot of work on reconstructing from what little evidence that we do have. So yeah, we don't have a lot of, of evidence of megalodon, but we do have all of their relatives. And none of their relatives have 13 gill slits. So it is highly probable that, that they didn't have 13 gill slits either, even though we don't have, you know, all of the fossils and everything like that, and we're doing a lot of estimating and guesstimating. So can I say 100% that they didn't have 13 gill slits?

• 12:30Speaker 02

  No, I cannot. But the chances of sharks going from 13 gill slits to five, uh, is, is, that's, that would be a lot of changes that would need to...

• 12:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I got you. Okay, that's fair. That's very fair, fairly argued there, I think. It's like...

• 12:45Jordan Klepper?

  I don't know, Neil. Neil, pushback on that science. If you're trying to base on like my weird uncle, if you're using my weird uncle to date whether or not I'm going to be a 350 pound conservative from Indiana, it's not gonna match.

• 12:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, that's what happens, because you know, the anthropologists, they find the one skeletal remains, and then everything about the entire species is anchored to that. So if they found your uncle, and that was the representative human of all humans, you know, you're saying we'd have issues.

• 13:15Jordan Klepper?

  That's, we would have issues. As long as they don't go looking in suburban Indiana, then he's not going to be the original man.

• 13:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The fossilized version of the original man. So a variant on this is, do you portray your dragons with four limbs plus two wings? Or, that is, one, two, three, four appendages plus two wings? Or are the front limbs the wings? Okay? And so, in, in Game of Thrones, the dragons, the front limbs were the wings, as is true with bats and any other sort of vertebrate that flies. So you can't just throw in another pair of appendages and, in the model that we have here on Earth.

• 14:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So is that a fair analogy, Jasmine, do you think?

• 14:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, definitely. I mean, you have to use what information you have, and yeah, we're drawing dinosaurs and, and prehistoric creatures and stuff to the best of our abilities. I'm sure we get things wrong, but we do have a blueprint. You know, they didn't totally change shape that quickly. That's not how evolution happens. You don't go like, oh, and then suddenly there was an individual born that had an extra pair of limbs, and then they procreated with another individual that had an extra pair of limbs, and suddenly everyone had an extra pair of limbs. That's not how that works.

• 14:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's very Bio 101 right there. Evolution 101. All right, Jordan, what else you got?

• 14:49Jordan Klepper?

  I got another Patreon subscriber, Joy Panero Denise. Considering mammals return to the ocean and dominate it, have sharks reached an intelligence plateau? Would climate change ironically provide an opportunity for sharks to adapt and become more intelligent?

• 15:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh, I like that. First, Jasmine just said it straight. The mammals in the ocean did not evolve there. Is that correct? That mean they were mammals on land and returned to the water.

• 15:20Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 15:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That is crazy.

• 15:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's a lot of back and forth. So like, so we have life starting in aquatic setting. Then there were some that went to land and they did all of this evolution on land. And then they were like, you know what? Land is like, nah, I'm just gonna go back.

• 15:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Land is overrated.

• 15:40Jordan Klepper?

  Like Tulum. You're like, oh, it was cool for a little while, but I'm coming back.

• 15:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They went back into the ocean, which is weird because the ocean can kill us as humans, right? You don't, this is not a first thought. And so for some species to have that thought, they've got to have some pretty good adaptable elements to them.

• 15:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, so you, I mean, you have, especially where you had situations where there were major predators on land and they couldn't go in the water. So why don't you just run into the water and then the predator can't get you? And then, you know, you have some individuals that are born with some special adaptations that help them in the water. And then they're more successful because they can hang out in the water and avoid the predators. And then that just kind of builds and builds and builds and builds and builds. So you have this situation where you're like, there are lots of dangerous things on land that are trying to eat me. Wouldn't it be great if I didn't have to contend with those individuals? And so that's kind of how this directional shift happens.

• 16:43Speaker 02

  And then you also have things like, you know, big asteroids and stuff just like decimating the air quality. And if you were in the water and you didn't breathe air, you're like, haha, joke's on you. It's not a problem for me.

• 16:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's cold. You're gonna carry on like that. That ain't right. Also, it seems to me that a lot of the aquatic mammals have a very significant fat layer on their bodies. So if you were sort of fatter, plus fat is more buoyant than muscle, so if you were a fatter mammal, you could survive lower temperatures in the water relative to other mammals. And you wouldn't have to come out as soon. So I see how this could lead, lead to this. So, so yeah, so in the future, if our only salvation is the ocean, the skinny people all die.

• 17:33Jordan Klepper?

  Oh, no.

• 17:36Speaker 02

  Your crazy uncle, Jordan, he knows what's up. He knows what's up.

• 17:40Jordan Klepper?

  I was going to say, as you were saying that, I was like, the larger folks survive longer. He might do OK in Indiana.

• 17:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We gotta take a quick break, but when we come back, more with Jasmine Graham. We're talking about sharks, past, present, and future on StarTalk.

• 18:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're back. StarTalk. My co-host, Jordan Klepper. Jordan?

• 18:22Jordan Klepper?

  Neil, sharks. You know, we started this and we both agreed that we were walking into this with a certain amount of ignorance. And I'd like to think I've learned nothing up to this point. But that's not because the information isn't good. It's just it's really hard to get through me. Right now, I'm still thinking about the logistics of the movie The Meg, but I'm gonna get through it.

• 18:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  OK. So you just confessed the density of your skull to both of us.

• 18:46Jordan Klepper?

  Oh, no. I wasn't supposed to tell anybody.

• 18:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Jasmine, you have a master's degree in biological sciences of Florida State University. Florida, there's a lot of marine science in Florida colleges, isn't that right?

• 19:00Speaker 02

  There is. I mean, we're a peninsula. We got a lot of ocean.

• 19:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Got a lot of ocean. Plus, you're gonna be gone in the global warming.

• 19:06Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. Miami is gone.

• 19:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Gone, yeah.

• 19:09Speaker 02

  Sorry, Miami.

• 19:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Florida, like, the average sea level in Florida is like an inch above sea level. Lucky high tides don't take them out every single time.

• 19:18Jordan Klepper?

  Colleges in Florida having to do with climate change and also the way we fund upper education, not something to invest in.

• 19:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Not the best combination there. So, how long have you been interested in sharks?

• 19:29Speaker 02

  Uh, since my freshman year of college.

• 19:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so what, did you watch Shark Week or something on Discovery Channel or something?

• 19:38Speaker 02

  I did watch Shark Week when I was a kid and yeah, we watched, watched a lot of Discovery Channel. Um, but I didn't think about sharks, really. Like, you study them? That was not a thought that crossed my mind. I actually didn't even know that you could be a marine biologist as a career until I was like a junior in high school. And then I was like, what? You can get paid to do this? And then I went to college and I, I met a professor who did shark science and, and did the evolution, study the evolution of sharks. And he was just super excited about sharks. And then I just got excited by osmosis. I was like, sure, I'll just come work on sharks. And then the more I got into it, the more I was like, wow, sharks are really, really cool. I'll study sharks forever.

• 20:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Excellent, excellent. And because they're so different from other marine species, just everything I read, they, they don't have bones, right? They just have cartilage, is that right?

• 20:31Speaker 02

  Yep, just cartilage.

• 20:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so their teeth are stronger than their scaffolding?

• 20:38Speaker 02

  Yeah. Which is important if you're a predator. Like, that's important. You gotta be flexible and nimble to chase things and you gotta have strong teeth to eat them. It's like, it's a perfect design.

• 20:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Perfect killing machine. All right, Jordan, you got more questions for us?

• 20:54Jordan Klepper?

  I do. We've got a question here, uh, from Facebook. This is from Kevin Hardy. Why are surfboards and wetsuits painted black to make humans look like seal food to sharks? Why don't we use high contrast zebra prints to break up the silhouette?

• 21:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh. So, so, so, wait, wait, just so I understand, if you look up from below, the, the shadowing of the surfboard, it looks like a seal? I didn't know, I didn't know that. That's what this implies. Okay, so Jasmine, yeah, so what, the surfer community?

• 21:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They almost take pride when they show you their shark teeth scars, right? That they survived it. What, what, what's your responsibility to them?

• 21:35Speaker 02

  So if they, you know, if a shark is looking up at them and they're on the surfboard, yeah, it does kind of resemble a seal or something that is actually shark food. And so, yeah, like with the, with the coloring and the, the pattern and stuff, that's not gonna really make a huge difference because sharks aren't really gonna be able to tell that you're zebra print from life if they're looking up at you. They're just looking at the outline, at the shadow. So the best thing to do is to try your best not to look like a seal. So like try not to flail around and, and definitely don't surf in areas where there's high shark activity. Like if there is, you know, some bait balls or something, bait balls are like huge clouds

• 22:20Speaker 02

  of fish swimming really fast in one direction. They're running away from something. You should probably move.

• 22:29Speaker 02

  And just be observant.

• 22:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  To take your cues from other species.

• 22:33Speaker 02

  And, and you know, if you have any sort of dead or decaying animal around, then yeah, don't go. So like there's a movie, a movie called The Shallows that came out a while ago where she's like surfing by this big decaying whale thing. And I'm like, first of all, why? Like the, there is a large decaying animal, just like a smorgasbord for sharks. And you're like, I'm gonna go surf right here. And then I'm gonna get knocked off my board and I'm gonna climb on the dead whale. Why is that a decision that you made? Like just stay away from things that sharks eat so you don't get confused with food. Because, you know, usually you have shark bites and for the shark, it's like, hmm,

• 23:18Speaker 02

  I wonder what this is. I wonder if this is edible. Chomp, ew, no, that's not what I thought it was. Swim away. But like that little chomp is like, whoop, there goes your life. So you don't want to even be in a situation where the shark is confused and needs to check you out. Just like, you know, keep, keep your distance away from things like huge bait balls or like where people are fishing or dead decaying animals. And just if you, if you have a lifeguard or someone tell you like, hey, there are sharks mating in this area. I don't think it's a good idea for you to go surfing. Don't say like, this is America, I can do what I want.

• 23:57Speaker 02

  You can, but that might not end well.

• 23:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There's Merck.

• 24:02Jordan Klepper?

  So as long as Americans are just logical and think through things, we'll be fine. I don't have a lot of faith.

• 24:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, uh, anyhow, so Jordan, give me some more.

• 24:13Jordan Klepper?

  Uh, you know what? We're gonna, we're gonna stay on this movie inspired idea. Somebody really wants to know, Cameron Jefferson from Facebook. If a tornado started over a school of sharks, what would really happen?

• 24:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It. I don't know what you're talking about.

• 24:26Speaker 02

  I'm sorry to say.

• 24:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, Jasmine and I don't know what they're asking about.

• 24:31Jordan Klepper?

  Neil, you know Neil. Neil, admit it. You and I have talked offline about Sharknado for hours.

• 24:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, we have not.

• 24:38Jordan Klepper?

  Your favorite movie. Your posters up right now. People can see your office. It's nothing but Sharknado posters.

• 24:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, Jasmine, what, what's, what's up with that?

• 24:47Speaker 02

  So as glorious as it would be for an entire school of sharks to be lifted up in a tornado and just like plopped at another location. Uh, no, sorry, that's not how that works. But it would be so cool and like, you know.

• 25:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jasmine, you're undermining the main premise of that movie series.

• 25:07Speaker 02

  It's still, it's still a great movie series because it is utterly ridiculous and super entertaining. And don't let that stop you from enjoying Sharknado. Like, don't let it stop you. It doesn't claim to be accurate. It's not what it's claiming to do. It's claiming to entertain and it succeeds.

• 25:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I thought, I thought it was based on a true story. My bad.

• 25:29Jordan Klepper?

  Yeah, the, the great Sharknado of 1917.

• 25:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Jordan, I don't, you guys know, I had a cameo in Sharknado 6.

• 25:40Jordan Klepper?

  I didn't know that. You were in Sharknado 6?

• 25:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, I had a cameo. And I was overlooked by the Academy. I thought, you know, I thought that performance was totally worthy of some kind of award, but no.

• 25:53Jordan Klepper?

  Do you remember your line from Sharknado 6?

• 25:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, no. I played Merlin. And, because in Sharknado 6, I bet you didn't know there were five other Sharknados.

• 26:05Jordan Klepper?

  I was gonna say, there's multiple surprising pieces of information.

• 26:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jasmine, did you know there were six?

• 26:12Speaker 02

  I knew there was a lot, but I didn't know the number.

• 26:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. So, in this one, the tornado opens a portal through the space-time continuum, and goes back to medieval days. And in so doing, shark DNA merges with dragon DNA. So you have shark-dragon-nados. And I'm in the medieval times, Dark Ages really, and I'm, I play Merlin, and I do actual science, but people think it's magic.

• 26:41Jordan Klepper?

  That's a pretty good call.

• 26:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's what I thought. That's what I thought. I said, I could do that. I could do that. And I think I ride one of these shark dragons in the tornado. I was on a green screen, you know, rocking pony. But, yeah.

• 26:55Speaker 02

  But important question, how many limbs did this dragon in Sharknado have?

• 27:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't even remember. But Jasmine, I'm very proud of you and delighted to hear that you were entertained by this movie series without being distracted by the little bit of science that got wrong.

• 27:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Jordan, give me some more.

• 27:16Jordan Klepper?

  Let's head to Facebook. We got Manuel Argayo. He asks, "What innovation use today can we attribute to research done with sharks?" Actually, I like to put, Neil, we've talked in the past about our love of space, our love of NASA, and all of the fun innovations that come from focused on trying to get to places like the moon.

• 27:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, you did a whole, you did a whole special when you visited NASA headquarters.

• 27:41Jordan Klepper?

  We did, yes.

• 27:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Not headquarters, one of the centers, yeah.

• 27:44Jordan Klepper?

  Yeah, we talked all about that. Even those who are frustrated about our attempts to get back to the moon or to Mars, it's the byproduct of that kind of ingenuity is bad.

• 27:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, so Jasmine, can you justify what you do?

• 28:00Jordan Klepper?

  That's the more direct way of saying.

• 28:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just I get that all the time. So let me now get to dish it out to you. All right, Jasmine, what good is it for the rest of us?

• 28:10Speaker 02

  So there's, there's a lot of materials that come from sharks that people use in things like lotions and medicines and, and makeup and stuff like that. There's a, a compound that's found in their livers, which helps them be buoyant, um, that people use on a lot of different things. Um, also a lot of.

• 28:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, I didn't know sharks wore makeup.

• 28:33Speaker 02

  They, they don't, but people do. And yes, for all of these people out there that are right now, looking at your lotions and being like, it doesn't say anything about sharks. Um, it usually calls it like squalline or squalla, something that is, that is shark liver.

• 28:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Shark extract. Whoa.

• 28:53Speaker 02

  Whenever you're putting that on your face.

• 28:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, okay. So, so, okay. So you make, you got this list in progress. All right. So what else?

• 29:01Speaker 02

  There's also been a lot of engineering feats so that have been based off of the hydrodynamics of sharks. Cause you know, they've spent millions of years evolving. They're super speedy. They cut through the water super fast. So a lot of that engineering principles, when they're designing underwater vehicles and things like that comes from you looking at the structure that evolution has already provided as the winning structure, which is the sharks.

• 29:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I thought I remembered, wasn't there some bathing suits in the Olympics that people wore that I, am I remembering this correctly? That was inspired by shark skin or something?

• 29:36Speaker 02

  Yeah. So they had denticle or things like dentacles, which are these modified scales that sharks have. They kind of look more like teeth, actually. And as someone that's gotten shark burn a lot, um, it really hurts whenever they rub against you. They are sharp. They are sharp little things. And yeah, shark burn is a thing. If a shark rubs against you.

• 29:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. But wait, wait. So, but why would you make a swimsuit out of that, uh, that resembles that?

• 30:04Speaker 02

  Because it helps them cut through the water really quickly. It cuts down on drag and friction as they're moving through the water.

• 30:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, okay. You could, what, I, I get it now. Cause what you can have things that look like they would interfere. What would they do is they break up turbulence and force much more laminar flow where you can go through. Okay. I'm with you on that. Very interesting. Very, very good. Okay. And something else about the teeth, did we, anything we can learn about the fact that they have multiple teeth? Multiple generations of teeth?

• 30:34Speaker 02

  Yes, they have rows of teeth. So basically their teeth are just always good to go. So, you know, you chip. I mean, they're, they're eating things that are really tough and they're tearing at stuff and they're like, oh, I chipped a tooth or my tooth fell out, whatever. There's another one back here and it's just like, whoop. Um, and so they're, they just always have fresh teeth. It's like whenever you have knives, your knives get dull and you have to like re-sharpen them. How cool would it be if like you used your knife and it got dull? And you're like, it's fine. I got another knife right here. It's like, whoop, whoop. Super useful.

• 31:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so, okay, so it's because sharks are so different from all other aquatic fishes that it gives us these sort of unique, interesting questions and solutions?

• 31:21Speaker 02

  Yeah. And I mean, they do lots of really cool things, like they heal super quickly, which is something that we as humans are like, hey, how do they do that? That might be something that's useful. How are they healing themselves? Maybe we can use that in medicine and things like that. There's a lot of diseases that they don't get that we are interested in researching and trying to figure out what makes them resistant to those types of things and, and can we recreate that and use it in human medicine and stuff like that? So there's a lot of things. Whenever you have something that has been evolving for so long, it's like, why reinvent the wheel? Nature already figured out what works. Like, humans aren't going to do any better. We should just like borrow what nature already figured out. We could figure out a way to make it useful to humans.

• 32:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. So what's left unsaid here, Jordan, is to get all of these products and to study the shark in this way, you have to kill the shark.

• 32:14Speaker 02

  Sometimes do, yeah.

• 32:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. It's not like we're studying primate livers and making lotion out of it. There'd be objections to that. So I think the, since sharks like to eat us, we don't have any problems killing them for whatever purpose that can serve us in return. It's, it's unspoken, but that's basically true.

• 32:35Jordan Klepper?

  We've set up, we've set up a way in which it's fun to watch the gladiatorial nature of man versus shark. So therefore we get good lipstick out of it.

• 32:45Speaker 02

  So yeah, unfortunately, there are a lot of sharks that are killed like a hundred million a year, and that's why we're doing a lot of things for conservation of like, alright, guys, we're killing sharks way faster than they can replace themselves because they they grow slowly, they take a long time to mature, and so we don't want to to take them out faster than they can replace themselves. So there's all kinds of conservation and stuff that goes into that where we're moderating monitoring the stocks and we're doing things like assessing their their population sizes, and we are trying to put regulations in place of like, there's not a lot of these types of sharks left, you can't fish for these

• 33:26Speaker 02

  types of sharks. So we're definitely moving a lot into the regulation. But I think a lot of it is like what you're saying, we have this negative perception of sharks, which is unwarranted because they're just living their lives, and we therefore feel like we could do whatever we want to the sharks versus like a dolphin that's like, everyone thinks is all cute and whatever, but really they're like the same, one's a mammal, one's a fish. But they are both apex predators, they both have shark teeth, they both are really good at what they're doing, but we've decided that dolphins are cute and sharks are scary, so we can kill sharks.

• 34:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, so if you if you drag a dead shark into the onto the beach, and say, look what I killed on my boat, because wow, that's cool. If you dragged a dead dolphin, say, look what I killed, people would ostracize you.

• 34:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is speciesist, or what's the word, speciesist? You're a specist. Species, species. Yeah, you're being you're being specist, yeah.

• 34:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, definitely. So that's why

• 34:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're racist, you're speciesist.

• 34:29Speaker 02

  We're working so hard to change the perceptions that people have of sharks and and trying to show them like, okay, this there's a lot of benefits to sharks, especially the ones that are apex predators, they're maintaining balance in the ecosystems, they're really important, sharks aren't out to get you, they're not like hunting you down, they're not really even worried about you. And yeah, it's just people are really afraid of getting bit by a shark. Which, yeah, sucks to get bit by a shark, but the chances of that happening are very slim. The chances of getting bit by a dog, however, are very probable, and we bring them into our houses and we put cute outfits on them, so like-

• 35:07Jordan Klepper?

  You're going into species territory right there. You be careful. You be careful. Well, some people like pit bulls. I don't know. That's what I'm saying. If you put a pit bull in your house.

• 35:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And some people like anacondas, you know? That's just what they-

• 35:22Jordan Klepper?

  Can't we just all be equally afraid of animals at the same level? I'm afraid of sharks. I'm afraid of pit bulls. I'm also afraid of dolphins. I'm afraid of cats. I can be afraid of everything on an equal level.

• 35:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, you should be concerned about all animals. Like, all animals have the possibility to injure you. Just give them their space and don't make them mad.

• 35:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, we got one more segment coming after this break on StarTalk.

• 36:01Speaker 03

  Hey, here's a Patreon shout out to the following Patreon patrons: Yakov Goldberg and Sebastian Roser. Guys, thank you so much for helping us make our way across the cosmos. Without you, this show would not be possible. And for those of you listening who would like your very own Patreon shout out, please go to patreon.com/stargradio and support us.

• 36:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're back on StarTalk, and where we left off in this shark edition of Cosmic Queries is Jasmine tells us that we shouldn't kill sharks unless we want to make lotion out of them, and then it's okay.

• 36:44Speaker 02

  That is not what she-

• 36:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's not what she said.

• 36:47Jordan Klepper?

  That's what I heard. I heard that too.

• 36:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, I heard that. I swear. I swear that's what she said. No, no, just, we need to understand how they fit into the ecosystem and not be so speciesist about what animals are cute and which animals are not. That's really what this comes-

• 37:02Speaker 02

  There are some cute sharks out there. Everybody, Google a picture of an epaulet shark. They're adorable. Adorable.

• 37:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The word adorable and the word shark appeared in the same sentence.

• 37:13Speaker 02

  They have little, they have little fins and they walk, they're super cute. Also bonnet heads are adorable. They look like they have little bonnets on their heads.

• 37:21Jordan Klepper?

  Take it from Jasmine, she has, she has picked up and held so many sharks.

• 37:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  She's picked up sharks, okay.

• 37:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, alright, so let's, let's keep this going.

• 37:32Jordan Klepper?

  Neil, I got something from, uh, Facebook. Joe Klopp. He wonders, given the fact that sharks are neither born live or hatched from what we would normally refer to as an egg, what does baby shark do, do, do, do, do, do, do?

• 37:51Speaker 02

  So I wanna-

• 37:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I didn't know, I didn't know any of that, so could you just catch me up on this, please?

• 37:55Speaker 02

  I wanna, I wanna clarify something. So, so there are sharks that are born live. It's not like a placental birth, like a, like a mammal. Um, but yes, there are sharks that are born live. There are also sharks that come from eggs that aren't like chicken eggs. They're like little leathery looking little pouches that are sometimes called mermaid purses, which is an adorable name. Um, but yes, so baby sharks, what do baby sharks do, do, do, do, do? They just try to survive because, uh, sharks don't have parental care. So like you are born and you are on your own. Whether you're born live or you hatch, uh, they'll try and, um, lay their eggs in a place where they're like,

• 38:39Speaker 02

  this feels like a good spot. I feel like my kids are gonna have a chance here. And then they're just like, bye kids. And then the, the sharks that are, that give live birth, you know, they like pop them out and the sharks swim away and they're like, cool, my work is done.

• 38:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow, so, so, so mammals have very few births per litter. And so how many, how many possible sharks can come out of a one egg laying session?

• 39:04Speaker 02

  That depends on the shark. There are some sharks that give live birth and they only have one. And, um, that's usually because they just, the one that develops first just like eats the rest or ingests the rest of them. And it's like, cool, thanks for the nutrients.

• 39:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jordan, did you hear that euphemism? It ingests them.

• 39:22Jordan Klepper?

  It ingests, oh.

• 39:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It doesn't maul them in their sleep, no, it ingests.

• 39:27Jordan Klepper?

  I get what you're throwing down. Yeah, okay. Ingest them.

• 39:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, and then there are some, there are some sharks that, that have very large litters, uh, like twenty or more, but it kind of really just varies between the, the different sharks of how many they're having. And even within species, there's, there's often a, a range.

• 39:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, alright. So, so what, so we, i- in, in mammals, there's, they're mammary, um, mammary food for them. What, what's the first thing a, a baby shark eats?

• 39:57Speaker 02

  So, for the ones that are cannibalistic, their siblings. For the ones that are...

• 40:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow!

• 40:02Speaker 02

  Yeah. It's a, it's a shark-eat-shark world.

• 40:05Jordan Klepper?

  You know what? You want us to not be afraid of sharks?

• 40:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They eat their own siblings!

• 40:13Jordan Klepper?

  The parents drop them off and are like, "You're good. Eat, eat your brother."

• 40:19Speaker 02

  Well, usually, usually...

• 40:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, if your, if your little brother's annoying, just eat him.

• 40:24Speaker 02

  The eating of the siblings usually happens inside the mom. So, if, if the mom doesn't even see the other ones.

• 40:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's worse. I don't know. That's something, that's worse. That's worse. The, you, she said, wait, Jordan, she said that like, "No, it's different. It happens inside the mother."

• 40:40Jordan Klepper?

  It's an entire family working together to eat one of them.

• 40:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, that's what happens. Um, and then the rest of them, usually, it's yolk. They'll have a yolk attached to them, a yolk sac, that's their nutrients. And then, once that's gone, usually they, you know, they've developed enough where they can hunt on their own. And so, yeah, so usually, it's, they're either cannibalistic, or they have a yolk.

• 41:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Man, that's a tough life. I'm, I'm staying on land, by the way. I'm not gonna be one of those that goes back in.

• 41:10Jordan Klepper?

  Yeah, it feels much safer here.

• 41:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jordan, give me another one.

• 41:15Jordan Klepper?

  Yes. We have here from, uh, Zenzino Ferrara, uh, from Facebook. "Since we know our moons have influence on tides in our oceans, uh, there is some kind of influence, uh, is, there's some kind of influence by the moon in sharks' lives?"

• 41:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, interesting.

• 41:33Jordan Klepper?

  Uh, as in, the zones they choose to live in our oceans? And all the best to you guys. I hope you stay safe.

• 41:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Excellent question. Thank you for that. Yeah, so Jasmine, tell me about the astronomical influences on shark behavior.

• 41:46Speaker 02

  Yeah, so that's something that a lot of sharks actually there. We think that their migrations are actually triggered by um moon phases and things like that.

• 41:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Only if they're Sagittarius and then no.

• 42:01Speaker 02

  And then there's a lot of, obviously the tides and the moon are really, really connected. And so there's a lot of sharks that that move with the tides with looking for their prey. And so they'll.

• 42:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Could could it be that because when the when the tide goes out? Deep water becomes shallow and certain fishes become if not entirely stranded. They certainly can't escape to safety. Would a shark risk getting stranded itself to go on shallow shallow tide tide waters?

• 42:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, so so sharks go into shallow areas and and then there are some sharks that can handle lower salinities. And so they'll actually swim up into the rivers with the with the tides. And they get everything that's like coming in because they're they're like, oh, OK. The tide is changing and their their food is kind of moving with the tides. And then they kind of get funneled into the mouth of this river because there's only one way for them to go. And then the sharks will be like, haha, smorgasbord. And they just sit there at the mouth of the river and they're just like, I'm going to eat everything.

• 43:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So the sharks took astronomy 101. They know about tides and estuaries and brackish water versus freshwater. These are intelligent sharks. There are evolving in intelligence, the way that earlier question had inquired. We'll find out, you know, in another million years, they'll be running the world.

• 43:23Jordan Klepper?

  This is it's it's coming right from the horse's mouth there, you know. Now I'm afraid of rivers. I thought rivers were safe. Now you tell me sharks are sneaking up there as well.

• 43:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, this is this is a very depressing session here.

• 43:37Jordan Klepper?

  I know.

• 43:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, there are some sharks that can handle lower salinity waters for for short periods of time. Bull sharks are the the most famous of these. They can go up in the river and then they'll they'll come back. They have some special adaptations that help them maintain balance even when they're in lower salinity waters, which is super cool.

• 43:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. Time for a few more.

• 44:01Jordan Klepper?

  Yep, I got one from Twitter. Nathan Warden, how exactly do sharks smell blood in the water? And what is the real range of that smell?

• 44:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, I like that.

• 44:09Jordan Klepper?

  Yeah. How fast can blood travel in water anyway?

• 44:12Speaker 02

  So blood doesn't travel very fast in water. So you know how so so there's this myth, but that like, oh, you have a drop of blood, a shark is gonna smell it from a mile away. And I'm like, that's not how that's not how molecules move. They it has to dissipate. It's gonna take a long time to dissipate, just like if you're on one side of the room and someone farts on the other side, and there's like this wave where everyone across the room is slowly smelling it before you get it.

• 44:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In sequence, in sequence.

• 44:43Speaker 02

  And you like, you're like, oh, there's a bad smell coming, but there's no escaping it because you just see everyone reacting to it. That's just how smells dissipate in the air. Same thing happens in the water. So it's not like there's a drop of blood and all of a sudden, a mile away, this shark is like, oh, there's blood. No, it has to has to dissipate. And in actuality, that's way too diluted at that point, a mile away. It's gonna be too diluted for them to actually detect it. The most sensitive sharks, it would probably be more like a quarter of a mile before it gets to the point where it would be too diluted for them to be able to detect it.

• 45:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Plus, it has to they got to be plus if there are ocean currents, they wouldn't be able to smell it up upstream. They've got to be like downstream from it.

• 45:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's all sorts of things that need to happen. It's not like, oh, you have a drop of blood and suddenly all of the sharks in the world are just like descending upon you. That's not how it happens. Also, sharks aren't interested in the smell of human blood because they don't eat humans. Like, they would they would smell it, but it wouldn't they wouldn't react to it. Now, if you have a bunch of fish bleeding, yeah, okay, then they're gonna come check it out. But if it's if it's a human's blood, that that's not something that they're cued into because that's not what they eat. So they would, yeah, they would smell it, but they wouldn't be like, oh, that smells delicious. Let me go snack. That's not gonna be their reaction.

• 46:07Jordan Klepper?

  But if I've had like fish oil pills that morning, I cut my finger on a Bud Light, and I go into the water, how nervous should I be?

• 46:16Speaker 02

  You should not be nervous. You should not be nervous.

• 46:20Jordan Klepper?

  Drink and swim away, okay?

• 46:22Speaker 02

  You would be fine.

• 46:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So just time for like a few more, maybe we can do a lightning round. So let's try it. Jordan, go.

• 46:30Jordan Klepper?

  This is from Mike Irish 85 on Instagram. Studies have shown that low-frequency sound pollution possibly have negative effects on animal behavior in the ocean. Do sharks show up in these studies, and what are the effects?

• 46:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh, nice one. So like the rumble of a cruise ship rotors, I mean the propeller blades. Yeah, so what do we know about that, Jasmine?

• 46:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, there have been studies where they played sounds underwater and had baited cameras, and there were less, there was less shark activity around the baited cameras when there were artificial sounds played, so it does affect them.

• 47:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Baited, you mean it's got food for them, so they might want to come to the food. So this is a good experiment to see if the sound is so bad for them that they'll forego the food?

• 47:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow, okay. But no one cares about the sharks, so we don't care.

• 47:23Speaker 02

  I care about the sharks, y'all.

• 47:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, you care about the sharks?

• 47:26Speaker 02

  I care about the sharks.

• 47:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You care, okay. So no one, except Jasmine, cares about sharks, okay. All right, Jordan, good, good, quick answer. Let's have more of them get in.

• 47:37Jordan Klepper?

  This is from Amir Johns Kerr on Instagram. Are great white sharks really afraid of dolphins?

• 47:42Speaker 02

  It's more like a competition thing. Not necessarily fear, just like we're eating the same things, and if you're here, then I have to compete with someone, so I'm gonna go hunt somewhere where there's not anyone competing with me.

• 47:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, that's the smart thing to do.

• 47:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, work smarter, not harder. That's the motto of the sharks.

• 48:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Hmm, okay.

• 48:05Jordan Klepper?

  It's not, eat your brother if things don't work out.

• 48:10Speaker 02

  Oh, man, I should not have mentioned that.

• 48:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm not gonna shake that for years, though.

• 48:14Jordan Klepper?

  And to be clear, that question was a gimme. That question was about a baby shark. That was about a children's cartoon, and you were like, we should talk about childhood cannibalism.

• 48:26Jordan Klepper?

  Uh, here's another fun one. This is from, uh, Joe Placebo on Instagram. Are the Greenland sharks really over 500 years old and what makes them different from other sharks?

• 48:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, how lo- how long do sharks live?

• 48:38Speaker 02

  So, yeah, okay, so the, the Greenland sharks age is, is a topic of discussion among scientists. So people say 400 maybe, but like, meh, we're just, we just, yeah, around there. Uh, at least we've got it close. So, yeah, they, they live a long time.

• 48:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, wait, wait, wait, we didn't even know Greenland existed 400 years ago. No, I don't know when it was discovered, but we can't have possibly had good data 400 years ago to age date a shark from 400 years ago. How, how we, how do we know this?

• 49:11Speaker 02

  There's, there's other ways to, to do dating, um, you can do carbon dating, you can look at, at, um, the calcification on vertebrae, cause they'll have rings.

• 49:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, dead sharks.

• 49:23Speaker 02

  Like, yeah, dead sharks.

• 49:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Dead sharks.

• 49:24Speaker 02

  They're not, they're not asking the sharks how old they are now.

• 49:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right.

• 49:27Speaker 02

  About that thing.

• 49:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The modern shark.

• 49:29Jordan Klepper?

  I was just gonna say, the census is hard enough to get everybody to reply in America. Let alone Greenland sharks. Good luck getting an accurate count.

• 49:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Then how many people in the household? Well, I ate them.

• 49:41Jordan Klepper?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you have any siblings? Uh, that's a difficult question for me to answer.

• 49:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, Junior used to live, then, but not anymore.

• 49:53Jordan Klepper?

  Yeah, we used to, let's see, at the beginning of the year, there was three siblings.

• 49:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Whatever happened to Junior?

• 50:00Jordan Klepper?

  Uh, he was my brother, now he's just indigestion.

• 50:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, uh, uh, is it true that sharks just keep growing their whole lives?

• 50:09Speaker 02

  They do. They have what's called indeterminate growth, which means as long as they're alive, they will keep growing. Obviously, it slows down when they get older, but yes, they, they do keep growing. So the bigger the shark, the older it is.

• 50:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So these, okay, so, but the jury's still out on exactly how old the Greenland sharks might be.

• 50:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 50:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But hundreds, clearly.

• 50:30Speaker 02

  Hundreds, yeah.

• 50:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Damn.

• 50:33Speaker 02

  You know, we have, we have some specimens, but like, like I said, we can't ask every, we can't ask all the Greenland sharks. So whoever you, whoever you sample, that's like, okay, we found a Greenland shark that this, that's this old, but there could be others that are, that are older. That one could be the exception and not the rule. So.

• 50:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It could, it could be Jordan's uncle.

• 50:52Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 50:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It could just be weird.

• 50:54Jordan Klepper?

  He's gonna survive forever.

• 50:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So we've, we've got to actually bring this to a close. Let me just offer a reflection here. Based on all I've gleaned in this conversation, Jasmine, thank you for these enlightening points. I just wonder if, if our, if climate change continues and we keep destroying the whale population, like whales are not, you know, I don't know how much they're coming back, that could take away part of the, what's the term you use for who's at the top of the food chain? You had a great term for that.

• 51:31Speaker 02

  Apex predator?

• 51:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Apex predator. So then the shark has, there's nothing topper, higher than the shark, right? Then we go extinct on land and then the shark figures out it could come out of the water and go on land. And so if we come back in, you know, a million years, it won't be Planet of the Apes, it'd be Planet of the Sharks. And the Sharks would be like town mayor and the police and, and, and so that, somebody needs to write that story.

• 52:02Jordan Klepper?

  And in the sixth iteration of it, I know who's gonna play Merlin.

• 52:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'll be there if you need it. Jasmine Graham, thank you. This is your first time on StarTalk, I think. Is that right?

• 52:15Speaker 02

  It is.

• 52:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, well, thank you. And sharks are, they're perennially interesting to so many people, myself included, and I think maybe Jordan. So we'll try to have to get you back on and, because Jordan, how many questions did we not ask? Because we ran out of time.

• 52:29Jordan Klepper?

  Honestly, there were, there were a ton. I got, I got 10 more pages of questions.

• 52:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ten pages, okay. So we'll hold on to those pages. So, so Jasmine, again, you're co-founder of Minorities in Shark Sciences. And so we'll see, see more people of color in a field that historically we've never seen anybody. Of color. And you're also project coordinator of the Marine Laboratory and Aquarium. Very cool. So you're in it. Stay with it. Stay healthy. And Jordan, what's your latest project? When you're not interviewing Trump supporters, what do you do next?

• 53:01Jordan Klepper?

  Well, you know, I'm following the campaign with The Daily Show and I'm about to become a father real soon. So that's my, that's my next big project.

• 53:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A first time father?

• 53:11Jordan Klepper?

  First time dad.

• 53:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, wow. Okay.

• 53:13Jordan Klepper?

  Yes. So I'm gonna get to know that baby shark. Uh, real soon.

• 53:18Speaker 02

  I would recommend not introducing your child to Baby Shark. You will never hear the end of it.

• 53:25Jordan Klepper?

  I'm gonna take that. That's advice from an expert. I'm gonna take it.

• 53:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jasmine, delighted to meet you. Jordan, always good to have you. I'm Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist, signing off as always by bidding you to keep looking up.