Cosmic Queries - Black Hole Universe

Are we closer in size to an atom or the universe? Neil deGrasse Tyson and Paul Mecurio answer grab-bag questions about Hawking Radiation, power on the moon, and whether our universe is inside a black hole.

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

• 0:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A lot of cosmology questions in there.

• 0:02Paul Mecurio?

  Oh.

• 0:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Big Bang, multiverse, black holes.

• 0:04Paul Mecurio?

  Negative gravity.

• 0:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, people into that.

• 0:07Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah, I see you as a negative gravity person. Tend to be negative.

• 0:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Coming up, Cosmic Queries on StarTalk.

• 0:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

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

• 0:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  StarTalk begins right now.

• 0:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is StarTalk. Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist. This is going to be a Cosmic Queries grab bag edition. And to help me get through these questions, I got Paul Mecurio. Paul, how you doing, man?

• 0:43Paul Mecurio?

  I'm doing well. It's barren, Paul Mecurio.

• 0:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Barren, oh yeah. Sorry. Not barren as in you cannot reproduce.

• 0:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Your womb is barren. No.

• 0:55Paul Mecurio?

  I actually am. I'm trying to keep that under wraps.

• 0:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You have one son, so that's.

• 1:02Paul Mecurio?

  By the way, look at you all dressed up like a little schoolboy going to look at you.

• 1:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I dressed up you clearly you have no such reciprocal feeling for me.

• 1:10Paul Mecurio?

  Well, because you asked me to help you move furniture and so that's what I did.

• 1:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or plus, like, you're out of a job now.

• 1:17Paul Mecurio?

  I'm out of a job.

• 1:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What the hell happened down there? What did you do?

• 1:20Paul Mecurio?

  I.

• 1:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What did you do to piss off Paramount?

• 1:22Paul Mecurio?

  I broke CBS and Paramount apparently on the Late Show.

• 1:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're on the staff of the Late Show.

• 1:29Paul Mecurio?

  I work on the Late Show, perform on the show, and we're not going to be in existence come May.

• 1:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow.

• 1:34Paul Mecurio?

  And I am going to be sleeping outside in your bushes looking for any nickels I can find.

• 1:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I live in Lower Manhattan, I don't have bushes in my backyard.

• 1:42Paul Mecurio?

  We're going to get you something. Uh, yeah, so, uh, you know, I'm looking, you know, whatever.

• 1:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right.

• 1:48Paul Mecurio?

  You know, if you know anybody.

• 1:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If I know someone needs.

• 1:52Paul Mecurio?

  Needs an ex-lawyer.

• 1:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ex-lawyer, I forgot, you went to law school.

• 1:56Paul Mecurio?

  Investment banker. I could do M and A deals and make you laugh. And make you ravioli all at the same time. Come on, but I'm barren.

• 2:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Case people are wondering during one of our Patreon exclusive segments, one of our Patreon members where they get to view a Q and A session live, felt sorry for Paul Mecurio for not having a title.

• 2:19Paul Mecurio?

  And he came up with a great one.

• 2:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Commensurate with Lord Nice of Chuck Nice. So he got knighted some number of episodes ago. So, so they felt pity upon you.

• 2:29Paul Mecurio?

  That's a lot of people there.

• 2:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so they decided to call you Baron.

• 2:32Paul Mecurio?

  Yes.

• 2:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I thought Baron, that feels right. Baron Paul Mecurio.

• 2:36Paul Mecurio?

  I command presence. I have a presence. I command attention.

• 2:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We, I felt that work. And so I happen to have Excalibur in the office. My wooden leg, I got everything. I had Excalibur. And so we knighted you Baron Paul Mecurio.

• 2:51Paul Mecurio?

  Cut me on the neck, eight stitches, but otherwise it was great. So I'm honored and I want to thank.

• 2:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How did you know it was an accidental cut?

• 3:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What makes you think that was an accident?

• 3:02Paul Mecurio?

  I need security when I come on this show. Tamsin's got my back. So we're gonna, we're gonna do some, uh...

• 3:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, let's do some Q and A here. All right.

• 3:11Paul Mecurio?

  All right, just, just some general grab bag.

• 3:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But you're least employed through June, is that correct?

• 3:15Paul Mecurio?

  Through May.

• 3:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  May.

• 3:16Paul Mecurio?

  May, unless something happens and I screw something else up and get us fired earlier, but May. And, uh, and I'm also doing my, uh, Broadway show Permission to Speak, touring with it, and we have it on Patreon now. So people can go and enjoy it there and support it because, uh, I don't have any money. I'm poor. I'm out of a job. Uh, you know, I'm, I'm, you know, I'm eating hay, if you care. I'm a barren. I shouldn't be eating hay. I'm a barren, okay? All right, here we go. Opal Lehman. Hello, everyone. Opal from Atlanta. I'm 15 years old and was wondering, you said recently that we only know 4% of the universe. Well, Neil does. We know more.

• 3:56Paul Mecurio?

  4% of the universe, which includes everything we know. So do you think there are more types of science out there left, sorry, to create or discover, or would the rest of what we would know about the universe just be branches of what we already know?

• 4:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Love that question.

• 4:12Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah, it's a great question.

• 4:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ooh, good one.

• 4:15Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 4:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Good one. So let me not just, let me never say that something's just a branch of something else. That makes it sort of subservient to it.

• 4:24Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 4:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, let me give a slightly longer answer than you might have bargained for.

• 4:29Paul Mecurio?

  Oh, good.

• 4:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Beginning in the 1990s.

• 4:32Paul Mecurio?

  You know it's bad when Neil says it's gonna be a long answer.

• 4:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Top. The 1990s, NASA realized that there was some scientific questions that needed answering that did not sit comfortably within the

• 4:47Paul Mecurio?

  Known body of knowledge.

• 4:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, but certainly not even within the siloed sciences as they have been laid out, as we've come to think of them in college.

• 4:59Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 4:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're majoring chemistry, I'm majoring physics, I'm majoring in it, majoring in that. Nature doesn't draw those boundaries.

• 5:04Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 5:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We did.

• 5:06Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 5:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, one of the questions was origins. Origins of life. Is that just biology? No, life began on a planet.

• 5:16Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 5:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In a solar system.

• 5:18Paul Mecurio?

  Could be stellar or, yeah.

• 5:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, just the forces operating on this.

• 5:21Paul Mecurio?

  Right, right.

• 5:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And how's a biologist gonna answer that question without knowing what the sun was doing at the time life began, or what earth was doing? And so what NASA created were these origin centers, rather, they created funding umbrellas.

• 5:34Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 5:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Origins funding umbrellas, where you could enter into the room with, the figurative room, from all these different branches of science. And they would come together and ask questions of each other.

• 5:49Paul Mecurio?

  Because they're interdependent to answer

• 5:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Interdependent, to answer this other question.

• 5:52Paul Mecurio?

  Some of these, some of these questions.

• 5:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't wanna call that a spinoff. I wanna say that's a whole, brand-new way

• 5:57Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 5:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  to explore the world.

• 5:59Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 5:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So.

• 6:00Paul Mecurio?

  An extrapolation or an extension of

• 6:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, yes, there is new sciences to be plumbed. I don't wanna think of them as an entire branch of science. I'd like to think of them as new things out there, where people with different expertise may have to come together

• 6:16Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 6:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  to address those questions.

• 6:18Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 6:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I would say, that being said, probably the newest science out there is neuroscience. We're in our infancy. And I look forward to when it's in its maturity.

• 6:29Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 6:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Then we nip-tuck and fix all your, especially your mental problems, you know?

• 6:35Paul Mecurio?

  Well, you need a nip in the top. You really do. That's not even a real mustache, anybody. What about AI? Does AI potentially bring us to not either through the use of AI or AI itself, other types of science or the uses of various sciences?

• 6:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I haven't seen AI. That doesn't mean it won't still happen.

• 6:54Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 6:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But AI at its best today, I've yet to see discover something that was not otherwise on the internet.

• 7:04Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 7:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or put together, it's putting together things on the internet. But suppose you had a thought that no one ever thought of before, and it's not on the internet. Does AI have access to that thought? The answer is no. Could AI come up with that thought? That's my question. If it can't come up with a thought that none of us have ever had, nor have ever put it on the internet. There's a limit to where AI can take it.

• 7:28Paul Mecurio?

  But my thought is a manifestation of several things that I know, and the chances are statistically that AI knows some of those things as well.

• 7:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Of course. Not just chances are, it does.

• 7:38Paul Mecurio?

  And so it could form-

• 7:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Provided those things are online.

• 7:41Paul Mecurio?

  Right, which probably, statistically probably also, it could probably formulate the same question. Not as good as mine, if I'm really smart.

• 7:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Definitely. My point is, to make a completely new discovery. Could AI have come up with the general theory of relativity? Could AI have invented cubism? Cubism doesn't look like it came from much before it, okay? You know, there's no early cubistic paintings of Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo.

• 8:09Paul Mecurio?

  Can you tell me what branch, it's true. Can you tell me what branch of science we can use that compels people to take their bike on the subway? It's a bike. Ride the bike. It's not a moving bike rack, okay? I don't take my car to the airport and check it on the plane.

• 8:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It is a little weird.

• 8:26Paul Mecurio?

  No, it's a lot weird, and it needs to stop.

• 8:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's a little weird.

• 8:29Paul Mecurio?

  And I don't care if you live in New York or don't.

• 8:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Try to get it out of your way. They'll lift up the front wheel, they'll tuck it to the side where the door is.

• 8:36Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah, and their handlebars end up my butt, and that's not what I paid $2.90 for, whatever I'm paying.

• 8:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so the neuroscience surgery will adjust that first- In your brain.

• 8:45Paul Mecurio?

  Don't defend it. Dalmyr de Silva. De Silva? Dalmyr de Silva. Hey, Dr. Tyson. Uh, oh, this is from Brazil.

• 8:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But I see.

• 8:56Paul Mecurio?

  Berardo Zalanzo, Brazil. Assuming I got this right, uh, we can intuitively think of Hawking radiation as matter escaping a black hole when a pair of virtual particles is created outside of it. The anti-

• 9:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That is precisely correct.

• 9:10Paul Mecurio?

  Okay, you got that part right, and you get a dishwasher. Uh, the antiparticle falls into the black hole and annihilates itself with its counterpart already in the black hole. This sounds like a, uh, a movie. Leaving the other one loose to fly away. And since particles don't have-

• 9:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Make an adjustment there. It wouldn't have to be the antiparticle. It could be, but one of those two particles would fall in.

• 9:36Paul Mecurio?

  One of the two.

• 9:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 9:38Paul Mecurio?

  Okay. And since particles don't have identity, it's like that particle just escaped from the BH. My question is-

• 9:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The BH.

• 9:46Paul Mecurio?

  The BH.

• 9:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He's on a friendly basis with the- With the black hole. No black hole ever told me I could call it BH.

• 9:54Paul Mecurio?

  Well, you know, someday you'll be cool enough.

• 9:58Paul Mecurio?

  You gotta hang out with the cool kids to be hang out with the BH. Uh, the question is, why do black holes favor antiparticles? The creation of virtual particles should be random all the time, every direction. So it should be fifty fifty.

• 10:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, and my understanding is that's the case?

• 10:14Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 10:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As is, uh, his understanding. If I'm wrong, I don't know why I'm wrong.

• 10:18Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 10:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, but because when the particle, antiparticle pair is created, the momentum that they have is in random directions. So, it's, it's by quantum design random.

• 10:33Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 10:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, the, they have to go exactly opposite directions so that their momentum cancel. Okay, into that spot.

• 10:42Paul Mecurio?

  At the same speed?

• 10:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, sorry. It depends on what the momentum was of the photons that begat the particles. The point is, everything has to check out in the end. And when it checks out, check out meaning arithmetically balance out.

• 10:55Paul Mecurio?

  Okay.

• 10:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, my understanding is you could just as equally have an antiparticle in the black hole as a particle.

• 11:02Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 11:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If it's not that, I don't know why it's not that. And if that's the case, we've got to check with Jan 11 on that. So, so, yeah, his whole question is predicated on something that I also don't think is true.

• 11:15Paul Mecurio?

  Which is?

• 11:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That only the antiparticles fall back in, and the regular particles escape.

• 11:20Paul Mecurio?

  But we don't have proof that it is, that we don't have proof of that. Isn't that the case?

• 11:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, I'm saying, if it's true that only the antiparticles go in, I don't know why that's true. Any understanding I have of particle pair creation, they fly off in opposite directions and those, that set of directions are random to each other. So you can just as easily have a regular particle going in as an antiparticle. So he's right to be suspicious of this.

• 11:46Paul Mecurio?

  Right. It should be 50/50.

• 11:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm thinking, yeah.

• 11:49Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah, okay.

• 11:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 11:50Paul Mecurio?

  Got it. All right, great question.

• 12:01Speaker 02

  Hi, I'm Ernie Carducci from Columbus, Ohio. I'm here with my son Ernie because we listen to StarTalk every night and support StarTalk on Patreon.

• 12:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

• 12:23Paul Mecurio?

  This is Pratik Nagar. Hello, Dr. Tyson. My name is Aria, 12 years old. I'm from Salt Lake City, Utah. I love watching your explainers and the fun and knowledge that comes with it. While in class, the question came up in size, which are we humans closer to? The universe or an atom? I was very intrigued by this question, especially because atoms are incomprehensibly small and the universe is incredibly big. If we are closer to the size of the universe, could there be a time, knowing that the universe is expanding, that we are closer to the size of an atom?

• 12:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cool question.

• 12:54Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah.

• 12:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I've actually answered that question in my next book.

• 12:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Whoa. Called Just Visiting This Planet. Mm-hmm. And I will read you that question and answer from my book. Okay. If I may. Yes. Can someone pass my computer? Go ahead, read me a bedtime story. May I read you a bedtime story? Yes. So, as you may know, for 12 or so years, I wrote a question and answer column for the public, under a pen name, Merlin. That's why I have Excalibur in this office. I didn't know you did that. Because me and Merlin go way back. You're tight. You're like this, literally. We're tight. We're totally tight. And so people ask Merlin these questions. Merlin was my, the pen name. So, here it is, if I may.

• 13:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Dear Merlin, I am six feet tall. Comparatively speaking, which is the farthest away from my eye? The atomic particles in my little toe, or the most distant galaxies? That's the same question. Right. Since you're only six feet tall, there is no doubt that the distant galaxies are farther from your eyeballs than your pinky toe. Another way to address your inquiry, however, is to imagine you suddenly became 10 times taller, 10 times taller again, and so forth. After about 25 of these stretching exercises, your head will brush up against the most distant galaxies in the visible universe. Returning to your eyeball, imagine

• 14:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  you now shrink in successive steps, so that each shift takes you within one tenth of the distance to the atoms in your toe. So we increase by factors of 10, decrease by factors of 10. It would take only 15 shrinks to enter the nuclei of your toe atoms. Adding the two sets of jumps reveals that the entire known universe spans about 40 powers of 10. In one direction. No, you add them together, it's 40 powers of 10. But this seems... From small to large. And I don't mean this... So, what this means is, you are closer to the atoms in your toe, it's only 15 powers of 10 down, and it's 25 powers of 10 to the edge of the universe.

• 15:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, and I'm not trying to... That's the only way to answer that question. This seems like, and I'm not saying this to be... Oh, by the way, that book is Just Visiting This Planet. Available October 2025. Okay.

• 15:21Paul Mecurio?

  Not available in paperback. Uh, this seems like an obvious question that doesn't even need to be asked. And I don't mean that to be mean spirited, but like, to me, I'm a complete layperson. The answer was your toe. Of course it's 15 versus 25.

• 15:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, you didn't know that in advance. These are powers of 10.

• 15:41Paul Mecurio?

  I understand, but it's, there's no question that you're, the atoms in your toe.

• 15:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If I take a tape measure, the toe is six feet away and the universe is a, it's 14 billion light years.

• 15:50Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 15:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If you want to say it's obvious, the answer is obvious, that's what you should be citing. But in powers of 10, it's not obvious.

• 15:57Paul Mecurio?

  But this question wasn't in the context of powers of 10.

• 16:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But that's the only sensible way to answer it in the way they were debating it in their class. Elevate yourself to the level of the 12 year old.

• 16:11Paul Mecurio?

  Man, you were asking a lot of me today. I, uh, that's impossible.

• 16:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. So, uh, online, there's a, on YouTube somewhere, it was there. There's a 10 minute movie called Powers of 10. It's made in the 1970s, 78. And it starts with a man laying down at a picnic on a, on a, in a park outside of Chicago. And as we start with a scene, one meter wide and one meter tall of a man with it. And every 10 seconds, we're going to go 10 times farther away. And we do that. You see how many jumps? It's a, it's an early CGI, but it wasn't even use computers. It was, it was, it was very well done in its day.

• 16:57Paul Mecurio?

  10 times farther away.

• 16:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Every 10 seconds. And you go to the edge of the universe. They said now, then, then we zoom back. And it says, now we're going to go 10 times closer every 10 seconds. And so you go 10 times closer.

• 17:08Paul Mecurio?

  And it takes fewer 10 times. It's 10, 10s, right? It take, right? And that's all I'm saying is it's obvious that that would take 15, 10, 15, 10s to my toe.

• 17:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Thinking in powers of 10 to justify saying.

• 17:22Paul Mecurio?

  You don't know what I was thinking.

• 17:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's true. I don't know what you were thinking.

• 17:24Paul Mecurio?

  And that's why this relationship is never working. We need marriage counseling. Because you don't bother to think what I think.

• 17:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So I think we, we hooked up our guy with, with his answer.

• 17:32Paul Mecurio?

  Very good question. And this 12 years old, amazing. All right. This is master builder EJ.

• 17:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, but he's one of our fans. So it's not amazing that he says that. It's expected.

• 17:45Paul Mecurio?

  Can't even give a compliment. All right. Average question, 12-year-old. Try better the next time. That's Neil talking, not me. I thought it was amazing. Hello, everyone. This is Ethan Henning from Houston, Texas. I have a question about power sources. What would be the best power source for a moon base that would have the purpose of mining and sustaining the lives of astronauts for six months? Could it be fission? Maybe it's solar? I would love to know what you think. I love this podcast. It's my favorite.

• 18:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ask me why I'm dressed up. I lied to you and said I dressed up for you at the beginning of this.

• 18:21Paul Mecurio?

  Why are you dressed up?

• 18:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because hours ago, I was on CBS Mornings, their morning show.

• 18:26Paul Mecurio?

  Oh, right. I fell asleep during that segment.

• 18:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They asked me. So I get dressed up for TV, but with a little bit of, you know.

• 18:34Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah, when you come on the Late Show, which I work on, you wear a tie?

• 18:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You show some tie. I show some tie. Or the vest.

• 18:39Paul Mecurio?

  The vest?

• 18:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  One or the other. Both would be.

• 18:42Paul Mecurio?

  A little much.

• 18:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It would break the lens.

• 18:43Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah.

• 18:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  People bleed from their eye sockets. So they asked me about nukes on the moon. And first, we're making portable, not quite the right word, transportable nuclear power plants that could like fit in a truck. For example, if it's in a truck, it can fit in a big rocket. Okay? And these are nuclear fission power plants.

• 19:07Paul Mecurio?

  We've talked about this on the show, needing portable nuclear plants to drive AI.

• 19:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What you would do is if you have a computation farm somewhere.

• 19:19Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 19:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Where AI is intensely using energy.

• 19:21Paul Mecurio?

  Bitcoin.

• 19:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You take it off. Yeah, you're calculating for Bitcoin. You just take it off the grid. Give it its own power supply. You can't put it near a waterfall or this. And then you don't know if the sun is shining all the time. A nuclear power, transportable power plant. The word "plant" overstates it at that level. Power station. Power station. Then, yeah.

• 19:42Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah, that was the expert that we had on the show who talked about it.

• 19:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Exactly.

• 19:45Paul Mecurio?

  There's gonna be a lot of those.

• 19:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We did. So right now NASA is considering fast-tracking a nuclear power generator and about the size that I described. And one of those would give you 100 kilowatts. Are you kilowatt fluent?

• 20:01Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah.

• 20:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, no.

• 20:06Paul Mecurio?

  It's KW?

• 20:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Let's.

• 20:08Paul Mecurio?

  See, I know.

• 20:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 20:10Paul Mecurio?

  I'm not dumb, I'm smart.

• 20:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Let's become fluent together. You ready?

• 20:14Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah.

• 20:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So 100 kilowatts, kilo is what?

• 20:17Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm. Thousand.

• 20:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Thousand. So 100,000 watts.

• 20:20Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 20:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, that's the power that it can generate.

• 20:22Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 20:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  100,000 watts. Do you know the power drain of a hairdryer?

• 20:28Paul Mecurio?

  Uh, I'd say a kilowatt.

• 20:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, 1,000 watts.

• 20:31Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 20:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so how many hairdryers could 100 kilowatt? Power generator?

• 20:37Paul Mecurio?

  100,000. I'm sorry, what did you ask?

• 20:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Try this again.

• 20:42Paul Mecurio?

  I wasn't listening.

• 20:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Apparently. 100,000 watts generator.

• 20:49Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 20:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Your hairdryer draws 1,000 watts.

• 20:52Paul Mecurio?

  Oh, 10,000, yeah. Wasn't that the question?

• 20:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Start from scratch.

• 20:58Paul Mecurio?

  All right, okay, go ahead.

• 20:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  100,000 watts, a kilowatt.

• 21:01Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, 100,000 watts.

• 21:05Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A hairdryer uses 1,000 watts.

• 21:08Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So how many hairdryers can this sustain?

• 21:12Paul Mecurio?

  It's a thou- a thousand.

• 21:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're just pulling it out of your. 100,000 watts.

• 21:21Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So the hairdryer's 1,000 watts, it can sustain 100 hairdryers.

• 21:25Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 21:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so that's the energy level that NASA's looking at to create and send to the moon right now.

• 21:33Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So it's not some mondo power plant.

• 21:36Paul Mecurio?

  Mm.

• 21:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That can keep 50 hairdryers going on the moon.

• 21:39Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 21:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, and by the way, you wouldn't need a hairdryer because it's 200 degrees Fahrenheit.

• 21:44Paul Mecurio?

  Right, that's true. Just stick your head out the window.

• 21:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just stick your head out the window for a second, right? It'll completely dry. So these power plants at that size and with that wattage can run for eight to 10 years.

• 21:56Paul Mecurio?

  How do they deal with maintenance and that kind of?

• 21:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, these are, these are, this new generation, there's no maintenance.

• 22:01Paul Mecurio?

  No maintenance at all.

• 22:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it's very efficient in how it distributes heat to, and it's not going to over.

• 22:07Paul Mecurio?

  It's fission?

• 22:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Meltdown, it's nuclear fission of fissionable uranium.

• 22:12Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 22:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Which is not the same uranium as you might learn from a explainer we did on isolating uranium for energy or for bombs. So there's, there's how pure the uranium is for what your use might be. It's got to be really pure if you're going to make a bomb out of it. If you're going to make a power station, it doesn't have to be that pure. And so it's much more readily obtainable. So you, so nukes would do it for eight years, you never have to maintain it. If you had solar panels, by the way, no matter where the sun is in the sky on the moon, it's just as bright as it is anywhere else, because there's no atmosphere. So the sun is just as bright on the horizon as it is directly overhead. So you can have solar panels that just track the sun.

• 22:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It'll get 100% sunlight as long as the sun is above the horizon. Do you know how long a day lasts on the moon?

• 23:03Paul Mecurio?

  Uh, 24 hours?

• 23:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A month.

• 23:06Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm?

• 23:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It lasts a month.

• 23:09Paul Mecurio?

  What is a month?

• 23:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What do you think the word month came from? Have you thought about it?

• 23:16Paul Mecurio?

  No way.

• 23:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  How long it takes the moon?

• 23:18Paul Mecurio?

  Ah.

• 23:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, that's only the moon goes around the earth.

• 23:21Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 23:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But as it does that, it has, and it goes through phases. As it's doing that, it's experiencing a lunar day. So a lunar day is a month.

• 23:30Paul Mecurio?

  Okay.

• 23:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A month long. Okay, so two weeks.

• 23:33Paul Mecurio?

  I thought you had a speech impediment.

• 23:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's why you stared at me like, what is he saying? Like a dog?

• 23:38Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 23:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so two weeks of sunlight, two weeks of darkness. So you got two weeks of solar power generation. Problem is, if you exceed your power needs, the energy's got to go to somewhere, so put it to storage batteries. When it's dark for two weeks, okay? You might want to use the energy. However, batteries don't work well in the cold. As soon as the sun sets, the temperature drops from 200 degrees Fahrenheit to 200 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. And then it'll.

• 24:07Paul Mecurio?

  We haven't been able to come up with a battery that.

• 24:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We haven't, you'd have to like insulate the batteries and have some other heating source, so.

• 24:13Paul Mecurio?

  Just put a Tesla up there. Take care of it.

• 24:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Have you driven a Tesla in the winter? The battery?

• 24:20Paul Mecurio?

  Took me an hour to get across town when it should have taken me five minutes.

• 24:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so, yes, nuclear fission makes complete sense, given what we've done with it lately. You can create a reactor and just send it to the moon.

• 24:33Paul Mecurio?

  One last question on this, then we'll move on. So how do you protect the reactor from whatever, something could hit it, happen, what could happen on the moon that is?

• 24:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, a meteor could hit it.

• 24:44Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 24:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because there's no atmosphere and there's nothing protecting you.

• 24:47Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 24:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Meteor could also hit you.

• 24:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We finally have it protected. Bam, you're dead.

• 24:55Paul Mecurio?

  No, I'm coming to your house and I'm gonna just hide under the couch.

• 24:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Um, yeah, so a big enough meteor, you're not gonna protect, maybe you could bury it, for example, protect it that way.

• 25:04Paul Mecurio?

  How far away are we from this realistically?

• 25:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, the military already has prototypes that they're using.

• 25:10Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 25:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Of just the size I'm describing and, uh, so I think we're very close. Within years, not decades, yeah.

• 25:19Paul Mecurio?

  All right, let's move on.

• 25:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Next question.

• 25:21Paul Mecurio?

  Derek Evans, Dr. Tyson, this is Derek from South Windsor, Connecticut. I know where that is. Longtime listener and attendee of live events.

• 25:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Nice, thank you for coming to that.

• 25:29Paul Mecurio?

  First time Patreon supporter.

• 25:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We give three or four live events a year, typically in the region, uh, one in Connecticut, the Beacon Theater here in Manhattan, and we sometimes go to Jersey and to Philly. But yeah.

• 25:41Paul Mecurio?

  Those are great. I think you need a juggler at the beginning of it, just to kind of loosen things up.

• 25:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, it'd be you. You also juggle.

• 25:49Paul Mecurio?

  I'm gonna do anything come May.

• 25:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 25:51Paul Mecurio?

  Whatever. In a recent conversation you had about micro black holes, it had me wondering about interstellar travel. How could you travel vast distances while being sure to avoid these tiny black holes? And what time dilation or other unintended consequences would exist? Or do they radiate away fast enough not to pose any problems?

• 26:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, the larger the black hole, the slower it evaporates. It's obviously the inverse is then true.

• 26:18Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As the black hole gets smaller, the rate at which it radiates increases and grows exponentially.

• 26:26Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm. As it gets smaller?

• 26:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As it gets smaller. So it gets smaller, it gets smaller faster still.

• 26:30Paul Mecurio?

  Because some, it's compressing on itself?

• 26:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, it's not compressing, it's, uh, it's because its rate of evaporation has to do with its surface area.

• 26:37Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And the smaller it gets, the more surface area it has relative to the volume. It's an interesting fact about the geometry of surface area going as r squared, radius squared, and the volume going as r cubed.

• 26:53Paul Mecurio?

  The surface area?

• 26:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Of this, of the sphere.

• 26:55Paul Mecurio?

  Doesn't it decrease as it?

• 26:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It does, but the volume decreases faster than the surface area.

• 27:01Paul Mecurio?

  And why is that?

• 27:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's just the arithmetic of it, because the volume is-

• 27:06Paul Mecurio?

  Not a good enough answer, specifically why? Don't duck the question. Don't be a politician, answer.

• 27:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So this manifest, I think we have a whole episode on this. It's on size and life.

• 27:17Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 27:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So if you can ask, here's a certain surface area you have, and how much flesh is associated with that surface area? You can do that.

• 27:26Paul Mecurio?

  Mm-hmm.

• 27:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As you get smaller, the amount of flesh associated with the surface area drops faster than the size of your flesh that protects it.

• 27:37Paul Mecurio?

  Within, within the body?

• 27:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Within the volume, that's correct.

• 27:40Paul Mecurio?

  Okay.

• 27:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And since the evaporation rate is related to the surface area, the rate, it is sucking, sucking, it is, yeah.

• 27:49Paul Mecurio?

  Extracting?

• 27:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There's no such thing as gravity, black holes suck.

• 27:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Sorry.

• 27:56Paul Mecurio?

  You gotta, you should put that on a business card.

• 27:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, what's a business card? I'm gonna explain that.

• 28:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So as it gets smaller, the amount of volume that's gonna evaporate out gets smaller faster relative to the surface area, and so it evaporates in a flash of light. So a tiny enough black hole will not last long enough for you to come upon it and then put your life at risk. Plus, we don't expect there to be many of them, even if they were there. And space is really vast and really empty. You ever see, you ever see the video, the video, the sci-fi movies where persons trying to navigate the asteroid belt?

• 28:33Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 28:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Duck left, duck right, duck, duck, duck. Even in The Expanse, they did this, they got asteroids. No, you know the average distance between any two random asteroids in the asteroid belt? It's like 50 miles. Some, some number way bigger-

• 28:49Paul Mecurio?

  So you could literally-

• 28:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That they have ever shown.

• 28:50Paul Mecurio?

  So if you're driving through that, you could literally like use your knee to drive and eat a Big Mac, and then eventually-

• 28:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Put on makeup.

• 28:57Paul Mecurio?

  Put on makeup, answer some texts.

• 28:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The text.

• 29:02Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah. Yell at your kids in the backseat.

• 29:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In fact, Pioneer 10 was the, I think it was, the first spacecraft to traverse the asteroid belt. Americans, Americans, remain the only country to have probes outside of the asteroid belt. Okay? There was some concern, will it survive? Yes, it has survived. Of course it survived.

• 29:26Paul Mecurio?

  So, we packed a lot in there in terms of direct expression, or do they radiate fast enough?

• 29:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 29:32Paul Mecurio?

  To not pose any problems?

• 29:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's the answer, yes.

• 29:34Paul Mecurio?

  That's the answer, because of the dilation. Okay, got it. All right. Lily Rose, hello, Dr. Tyson and Lord Nice, or, but he's not here.

• 29:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, put in your name with your new title. Put it in right now.

• 29:47Paul Mecurio?

  Okay.

• 29:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Graft it in, go. Hello.

• 29:50Paul Mecurio?

  Hello, Dr. Tyson and Baron McCurio.

• 29:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 29:54Paul Mecurio?

  Lily Rose here, that really does roll off my tongue. Lily Rose here from Virginia. My question is, was the WOW audio signal ever solved? Have scientists determined what was heard, or do you have any theories on what it was? Thank you and love the show.

• 30:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so, back in the day, when we had chart recorders, there was a radio signal. But, radio is not the same thing as sound. We equate the two because we used radio waves to transmit audio into a box called a radio, and we associate the word "radio" with "sound." But, radio is a band of light that travels at the speed of light.

• 30:33Paul Mecurio?

  The sound is the result of?

• 30:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You can transmit sound with optical light, as you can do with fiber optics, for example. They have fiber optics, the speaker connections to your, so, you have to be clever about the modulation of the electromagnetic signal, and know how to read that and turn that into sound on the other end. So, the WOW signal was a radio signal that rose up out of the din of cosmic noise.

• 31:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And then it never rose up again.

• 31:04Paul Mecurio?

  How long did it, how long did?

• 31:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I, I don't remember how long it lasted, but the astronomers on, on duty, they say wow. That's why it's called the wow signal, like a wow and an exclamation point.

• 31:13Paul Mecurio?

  Can I just say something?

• 31:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What?

• 31:14Paul Mecurio?

  You guys couldn't have come up with a better name?

• 31:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What, holy shit?

• 31:18Paul Mecurio?

  No.

• 31:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What did you want?

• 31:19Paul Mecurio?

  I will, don't have a six-year-old name it.

• 31:23Paul Mecurio?

  Colly G Whisker, like what's the?

• 31:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  G Whilliger.

• 31:28Paul Mecurio?

  So.

• 31:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And it was before OMG, you know, no one knew how to do that yet.

• 31:32Paul Mecurio?

  What's the speculation on what, what the source of this was?

• 31:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If there, if that has been solved with some explanation, I don't know.

• 31:40Paul Mecurio?

  But how close, was there any?

• 31:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Here's what to say.

• 31:42Paul Mecurio?

  You speculate all the time.

• 31:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If we wanted to be aliens, and aliens should know better than this, you don't just send out one pulse of signal.

• 31:50Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 31:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You, you want a rhythm in there so that you, anyone eavesdropping on you will know it's not from the universe itself.

• 31:58Paul Mecurio?

  Maybe.

• 31:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You can't do just one blip, and if you send any blips at all, send them at regular intervals.

• 32:04Paul Mecurio?

  But it was a consistent signal?

• 32:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, it was one, it was one blip.

• 32:07Paul Mecurio?

  Maybe it was from another star system, an alien left the TV on and fell asleep.

• 32:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It could have, eh, eh, yeah, sure.

• 32:14Paul Mecurio?

  Well, you're gonna mock me, Mr. Wow? That's as plausible as naming this thing Wow Audio.

• 32:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, I'm saying, I'm saying I don't know what it is. And just because you don't know what it is, doesn't mean you know what it is.

• 32:30Paul Mecurio?

  Wow.

• 32:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow, you said wow.

• 32:33Paul Mecurio?

  God.

• 32:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Busted.

• 32:34Paul Mecurio?

  Oh my god.

• 32:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Busted.

• 32:36Paul Mecurio?

  It's not fair that you take acid for these and I don't.

• 32:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No.

• 32:38Paul Mecurio?

  Go ahead.

• 32:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, just to be clear, there are people who see something in the sky that they don't understand.

• 32:44Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 32:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They don't know what it is, and they say because I don't know what it is, I know what it is. It's intelligent aliens visiting from another planet.

• 32:52Paul Mecurio?

  No, but that's just people wanting to believe that.

• 32:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, this is my point, just because you don't know what you're looking at, it doesn't mean you know what you're looking at. That needs to be a bumper sticker.

• 33:01Paul Mecurio?

  Exactly.

• 33:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 33:03Paul Mecurio?

  Uh, has the wow signal, did, have they, has that been left alone? Is anybody still pursuing that?

• 33:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They went back to the, they couldn't find it.

• 33:10Paul Mecurio?

  To get a sense of what that is?

• 33:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, it's been, it's been revisited, as they say.

• 33:32Paul Mecurio?

  We're gonna move on. Conrad Dunphy, Dr. Tyson. Uh, Conrad Dunphy here from Portland, Oregon.

• 33:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Portland, love of Portland.

• 33:40Paul Mecurio?

  On the multiverse-ish JWST, coming out with a lot of data supporting the black hole universe hypothesis. What is the likelihood that physics within a different black hole would be similar to ours? And if those physics are similar, what would be the first guess at how we escape our black hole universe to visit another? Wormhole?

• 34:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow, it's a lot there. So, there's only some tentative...

• 34:10Paul Mecurio?

  Maybe for those watching that don't know JWST...

• 34:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  My people?

• 34:15Paul Mecurio?

  Oh, you never know.

• 34:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just 'cause you don't know what JWST is.

• 34:18Paul Mecurio?

  It might be somebody new.

• 34:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just 'cause you don't know what then... Okay, okay. So I'll explain it for others and not you, 'cause you already know it. Okay.

• 34:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Compelled by Paul to bring everyone onto the same page, JWST, James Webb Space Telescope, has, in one recent measurement, found evidence of possible rotation among an ensemble of galaxies, which we don't expect if the universe is... was born in the ways we expected via the Big Bang. Okay? It would mean there was some net rotation of the universe. We know from equations that are in one of these books, that inside a black hole opens a whole new spacetime continuum. So, a black hole's, however, a crete matter that circulate toilet bowl style. We expect black holes to have rotation rates.

• 35:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait a minute. If our universe has a rotation rate, and we are a spacetime existing with that, and we have a horizon...

• 35:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Are we in a black hole? There's a chance of that. Can't rule that out.

• 35:27Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 35:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. Now, if that means we're in a contained universe with our own laws of physics. In the multiverse, every multiverse would have a different, slightly different laws of physics. Quantum physics tells us that. You don't wanna visit those other universes.

• 35:43Paul Mecurio?

  Why?

• 35:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because the charge on the electron might be slightly different from what's going on in your body and you would collapse into a pile of goo. Totally mess you up.

• 35:54Paul Mecurio?

  So like Star Trek, the whole like, transport me, beam me up, like it could be a mess.

• 35:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You'd be a pile of goo. Yes. So, if you do find one with, I would, dare I say, identical laws of physics, then I don't mind being the first to step in there. You would need a wormhole to connect them.

• 36:10Paul Mecurio?

  Do you think it's plausible that there's one with an identical?

• 36:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, if there's an infinite number, there'd be one with identical. Yes.

• 36:17Paul Mecurio?

  Do you think we're ever gonna be capable of discovering?

• 36:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wormholing to another universe?

• 36:22Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 36:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't know. I want wormholes as badly as the next person. And I like the way-

• 36:28Paul Mecurio?

  Maybe you should work hard.

• 36:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I like the way Rick makes wormholes. You know, he has a gun or some device that'll do. He uses real science. Whereas this guy from, who's this guy? You know what I'm talking about. Doctor Strange-

• 36:40Paul Mecurio?

  Yeah.

• 36:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  From Marvel. He uses magic. That's, you know, that's what's that.

• 36:44Paul Mecurio?

  That's the worst.

• 36:47Paul Mecurio?

  Now I'm telling you, it should be out one. Um, alright, that was a great question.

• 36:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you'd wanna, you could probably do it with a wormhole, but otherwise, the universes are not connecting.

• 36:56Paul Mecurio?

  Connected and-

• 36:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's kinda what defines them as, as independent universes.

• 36:59Paul Mecurio?

  And even if you could go visit, you're not sure you want to because you don't know what you're gonna step into.

• 37:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Plus, you don't know if they're made of antimatter.

• 37:04Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 37:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The antimatter is not in our universe. Where did it go? If it exists anywhere. Maybe it made another universe. So here's what you do. Bring a little coin with you. You see a person in the other universe, you know, flip him a coin.

• 37:16Paul Mecurio?

  Hmm.

• 37:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If he spontaneously explodes-

• 37:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Quickly go back.

• 37:20Paul Mecurio?

  It's not the same. No, but the minute I entered the black hole through the wormhole, that that universe that.

• 37:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You have to come in contact with other matter.

• 37:29Paul Mecurio?

  Right.

• 37:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And you know, space is pretty empty. Deep space is very empty. Yeah. Time for one more.

• 37:34Paul Mecurio?

  All right. John Swiley. Hi, Dr. Tyson. A longtime listener, first time in choir from Athens, Georgia. With all the excitement around JWST's discoveries of unexpected.

• 37:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That would be James Webb Space Telescope.

• 37:47Paul Mecurio?

  So annoying. Unexpected mature galaxies. A question struck me. What, why does Neil Tyson have friends? That's a weird question. What if we're not actually seeing galaxies from the early universe, but instead light entering from beyond it? Not unlike a pinhole camera, could the big bang have been a narrow portal from apparent universe and JWST is now picking up photons that bled through that pinhole event horizon? Maybe these guys, those galaxies look so evolved because they are. Thanks for everything.

• 38:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow. Or we don't fully understand the formation of galaxies. I mean, just have, look at how extraordinary is your explanation to account for a mystery? Because we have mysteries all the time in modern astrophysics. So to say there's a portal to another universe, okay, but Occam's razor remains a very good tool to apply here. You know Occam's razor? It was like Occam said, one ought not posit multiplicity without necessity.

• 38:54Paul Mecurio?

  I say that every day. He still laugh for me. So how is that relevant?

• 39:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What it means is if you have a complex hypothesis to explain something and someone else is walking around with a simpler explanation, the simpler explanation is probably correct.

• 39:17Paul Mecurio?

  Right, but that's sort of answering the question from 30,000 feet. So if we're not actually seeing galaxies from the early universe, but instead light entering from beyond it, not on like a pinhole camera.

• 39:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so that's implying that we can see beyond the universe, rather than within the universe itself. So pick, you just make judgment as to what is most likely to you. And for me, extraordinary explanations, as Carl Sagan famously said, require extraordinary evidence. And while it's unusual to have these mature galaxies so early, maybe we don't fully understand galaxy formation. And the whole point of JWST, why it looks at the universe in the infrared, is to see galaxies being born that emit ultraviolet. And over the lifetime of the universe, redshift had expanded it until it has become infrared.

• 40:12Paul Mecurio?

  Is it a constant that when a galaxy forms, it'll always emit ultraviolet? I mean, there's so many, to me, as we talk about this, there's things we think we know, but we don't know, that anything could be happening out there, right?

• 40:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, but that's true, and we have to be open for that. But if you have some sense of how things do happen, there's no harm in starting with that assumption.

• 40:33Paul Mecurio?

  Right. Another great question.

• 40:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No harm.

• 40:36Paul Mecurio?

  Yep, no harm.

• 40:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  One more. It's a lightning round.

• 40:40Paul Mecurio?

  Paradox. Hello, this is Dennis from Salisbury, Indiana. Dr. Tyson, if gravitons do exist, shouldn't we be able to cancel gravity waves when putting them under close scrutiny? Can an equivalent to the double slit experiment be set up at LIGO to cancel the wave?

• 40:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So the bigger story is, if you can cancel out light, such as in the slit experiment, there's a bright line and a dark line.

• 41:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's bright, dark, and bright. Because the troughs add together and you get darkness, and the crests add together and you get bright. All right? They're wondering if you can take gravity, if it's a wave, cancel it out. And if you cancel it out, did you cancel out the gravity itself? That's an interesting question. Can you create negative gravity in this way? Or zero out the gravity in this way? And I don't think so.

• 41:38Paul Mecurio?

  Why are you hesitant on that?

• 41:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, also, what Lego was detecting is a change in the gravity, not the gravity itself. So, yeah, you can surely...

• 41:49Paul Mecurio?

  But if you can have change, then you could have negative gravity.

• 41:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, in principle.

• 41:53Paul Mecurio?

  Isn't that possible?

• 41:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 41:54Paul Mecurio?

  But we've not...

• 41:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  However, is it really negative gravity if it's just the part of the wave that is a trough rather than a curve?

• 42:01Paul Mecurio?

  Well, isn't negative gravity basically static?

• 42:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I would think, correct.

• 42:05Paul Mecurio?

  Right?

• 42:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct.

• 42:06Paul Mecurio?

  Or frozen?

• 42:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Correct. And you would need that if you wanted to make a wormhole. Because wormholes take negative gravity and expand holes in space-time.

• 42:16Paul Mecurio?

  Well, therefore, if a wormhole exists, then there is negative gravity must exist, right?

• 42:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Uh, no, but you can use negative gravity... Oh, sorry, oh, yes. Well, I don't know, unless aliens found another way to make a wormhole. If we see a wormhole out there, somebody discovered negative gravity. That's correct.

• 42:32Paul Mecurio?

  Okay.

• 42:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There you go.

• 42:35Paul Mecurio?

  That was it?

• 42:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right.

• 42:37Paul Mecurio?

  Great questions. Done.

• 42:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Love you, man. Thanks for coming through.

• 42:40Paul Mecurio?

  Always great to see you.

• 42:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right.

• 42:41Paul Mecurio?

  And I think I'm going to try to dress up a little bit more when I come here. I am a Baron now, so, you know.

• 42:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't know how Barons dress. So, this has been another installment of StarTalk, Cosmic Queries Grab Bag Edition, with Baron Paul Mecurio.

• 42:58Paul Mecurio?

  If you see me on the street, please salute and curtsy.

• 43:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And he's out of a job beginning May.

• 43:02Paul Mecurio?

  May.

• 43:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  When the Lake Show...

• 43:05Paul Mecurio?

  Anybody needs their house painted? Help moving? You know, I'm handy with tools.

• 43:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. This is StarTalk. Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist. As always, keep looking up.