Cosmic Queries in the O-zone: Saving the World with Susan Solomon & Stephen Andersen

How did we save the ozone layer? Neil deGrasse Tyson and co-host Chuck Nice break down the campaign to save the ozone layer with atmospheric chemist Susan Solomon and sustabaility expert Stephen Andersen. What can we apply to the climate crisis?

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

• 0:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

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

• 0:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is StarTalk. Neil deGrasse Tyson here, your personal astro physicist. And this is going to be a cosmic queries edition on the subject of mending the ozone layer. Chuck, my co-host, always good to have you here Chuck.

• 0:32Chuck Nice?

  Always a pleasure. Very excited for this.

• 0:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, you know, that ozone layer got mended. That's a thing.

• 0:39Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 0:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I didn't think we could do that.

• 0:40Chuck Nice?

  Like a pair of socks that we darned it. It's like, oh, I have a hole in the toe of my planet. How do I sew that up?

• 0:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, it got mended, it got darned. It got darned. So, my two guests, Susan Solomon and Stephen Anderson. Chuck, have you ever heard of them?

• 0:59Chuck Nice?

  As a matter of fact, I have.

• 1:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, because you're a learned man. Most people haven't. And what's weird is to have not heard of someone who actually saved the world.

• 1:09Chuck Nice?

  Exactly.

• 1:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is just a weird fact that such a thing could even exist.

• 1:14Chuck Nice?

  I'm in the process of working on two Marvel characters. And patterning them after. After these two.

• 1:26Chuck Nice?

  Susan and Stephen.

• 1:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, let's get.

• 1:29Chuck Nice?

  Wearing the capes and capes in everything, Neil. Capes in all.

• 1:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Capes in everything. Well, let me, let's take that moment to introduce Susan Solomon. Welcome to StarTalk. Stephen Anderson, welcome, welcome. And if you give me a moment to give some of your background here, you, you each received the Future of Life Award. That's even a thing. That's a thing. For your contributions to mending the hole.

• 1:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In the ozone layer, and it's given this award, I'm so glad this award exists because, you know, it's, it's given to unsung heroes, people who were under-recognized relative to what they actually accomplished in improving the world. And so, and they, and by the way, they also participated in the Nobel Prize for Peace, when it was given to the International Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, in 2007, for their contributions to those reports. So, you know, unlike most of us, they're trying to make the world a better place. Right.

• 2:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so, let's go back in time briefly, to 1989, something called the Montreal Protocol, an international treaty. You know, before, there was the Paris, you know, talks and the treaties that went on there. We had the Montreal Protocol, back in 1989, and that was trying to protect the ozone layer by phasing out the production of molecules, substances known to deplete it. And sometimes, people refer to it as the most successful treaty of our day. And Susan, you're an atmospheric chemist, I love it, and, yeah, and you're Professor

• 3:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  of Environmental Studies at MIT, in an endowed chair, the Lee and Geraldine Martin Professor of Environmental Studies, up in Cambridge. And so, and you spent most of your career with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. And Chuck, you know, I love it, because the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, they concern themselves with the ocean and the atmosphere, right? But if you pronounce the acronym, it's NOAA. I just thought that was cool. Yes, which is kind of cool. I guess NOAA himself didn't need NOAA, because he had God tell him, "Look, it's gonna rain in 40 days." Exactly.

• 4:00Chuck Nice?

  No, don't, don't listen to those people mocking you.

• 4:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And we have Steven Anderson here, Director of Research, American Director of Research, for the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development. Man, you guys are doing such good stuff. Man, what am I doing here with this podcast? I want, hire me.

• 4:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And you're co-chair of the Montreal Protocol for Technology and Economic Assessment Panel. So this is how people contribute via all of these panels. And you also were a liaison to the Department of Defense from the Environmental Protection Agency. So you are the right people for this formulation here.

• 4:37Chuck Nice?

  And Neil?

• 4:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What?

• 4:39Chuck Nice?

  Now that we have the requisite introductions out of the way, I just have to do this for both of these fine, fine scientists.

• 4:49Chuck Nice?

  That is applause, my friend.

• 4:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, that's applause.

• 4:51Chuck Nice?

  That's a great deal of applause. Arousing applause is what that is.

• 4:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, so let me ask you guys. Susan, let me begin with you. How does, how does this happen? I mean, somebody has to first discover that there's an ozone layer, that it has value to us, that it's getting depleted, that we are responsible for it, and then we have to do something about it, then create a committee, and then a, a, a, a, an international gathering, and then everybody has to agree to it, and then actually implement it. What, this, is that, who, who ever thought that was possible in this world?

• 5:35Speaker 02

  It seems kind of like a miracle, doesn't it?

• 5:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes.

• 5:39Speaker 02

  I mean, it is, it is just amazing that it happened. And Neil, I want to tell you, you are so perfect. I mean, you're great, but actually, the Montreal Protocol was signed in 1987, not 1989.

• 5:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh.

• 5:52Speaker 02

  No biggie, no biggie.

• 5:56Chuck Nice?

  Neil, that's, that's 24 months of failure.

• 6:03Speaker 02

  So, long story short, I guess, in 1974, two scientists who later won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry, Molina and Rowland, they won it together with Paul Krutzen, but Molina and Rowland's big contribution was to alert the world to the idea that the chlorofluorocarbons might someday deplete the ozone layer. Now, we thought this was going to be a small effect, a couple of percent, 100 years in the future, sound kind of like another problem, the way some people talk about it.

• 6:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, don't get us started on that.

• 6:38Speaker 02

  Used to talk about it, used to talk about it, but the interesting thing is that although they had certain things correct, they did not anticipate that things could be even worse than they thought. So it turned out...

• 6:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just quickly, Susan, you said chlorofluorocarbons, that sounds like a word with one or two too many syllables. So, tell us what the chlorofluorocarbon is?

• 7:06Speaker 02

  Well, you can picture a methane molecule, I guess most people have heard of methane, swamp gas, or what you put in your, you know, natural gas system, maybe.

• 7:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I have to explain this to Chuck. Chuck, it's what you tried to ignite at camp.

• 7:26Speaker 02

  Absolutely, that's it, that's it. So, take that molecule, and just tear off all the hydrogens, and put in fluorine and chlorine instead, and you've got a chlorofluorocarbon.

• 7:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, interesting.

• 7:41Speaker 02

  And the most important ones are chlorofluorocarbon 11 and 12, which I'm not going to give you the chemical formulas for, but most of the chlorine that's causing the problem is in that form. And then there's a whole zoo of other compounds, 113, 114, 115...

• 7:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And where did it come from?

• 8:01Speaker 02

  Yada, yada, yada. So we were using these molecules in ever increasing amounts. And ironically, uh, the main source was actually in, uh, your medicine cabinet. In things like hairspray and deodorant. But it was also, you know, oven cleaner and paint and anything else that you sprayed out of a can. Uh, had chlorofluorocarbons in them to make the stuff come out the nozzle. It was a propellant.

• 8:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, okay.

• 8:32Speaker 02

  It's, it's used for other things too. It's used as the cooling agent in refrigerators. It's, uh, it was used, I should say. Um, and, uh, it was used in foams. So, you know, foam insulation in the walls of homes that were built in, you know, like the sixties and seventies. Uh, but, um, we don't use any chlorofluorocarbon in those applications anymore. And yet we still have spray cans. We still have refrigerators.

• 9:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What do you, what do you, what do you know?

• 9:06Speaker 02

  Air conditioners. I mean, isn't that?

• 9:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The society didn't, didn't collapse.

• 9:10Speaker 02

  Technology is amazing. You know, you can actually do things lots of different ways, which is, which is what Steve's group, uh, helped, helped us to, uh, to show. So, uh, you know, we were gaily spraying our, our hair. You remember those horrible hairstyles of the seventies? You know, people, so, uh,

• 9:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Big hair, big hair needed hairspray.

• 9:30Speaker 02

  Beehives, beehives. Remember the beehives? They were great. So, um, uh, then these guys said, hey, if we keep doing this, we might deplete the ozone layer. And the amazing thing is that people actually said, oh, well, what can we do about it? And the answer was, well, you know, one thing you could do is throw away your spray deodorant and get the roll-on instead. And a lot of people said, oh, well, that's not really very hard, is it? So a lot of people did it in this country. Not in a lot of other countries, actually. It wasn't so in Europe, uh, which was the other major producer.

• 10:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait a minute, wait a minute. They use deodorant in Europe?

• 10:17Chuck Nice?

  I don't know, Susan. You might, you might want to check your sources.

• 10:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But let me ask, wait, Steven.

• 10:26Speaker 02

  I'm not even gonna go near that.

• 10:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, I know.

• 10:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just remind you, he's a comedian.

• 10:32Speaker 02

  I got it.

• 10:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, so Steven, Steven, let me ask you, how do you, how do you tell people to get rid of what they have if in that moment you don't have something to replace it with? Or did you?

• 10:43Speaker 03

  That's exactly the question, and I would just add to what Susan said before we move on, that one of the stimulants for action was the scientists Sherwood Rowland and Mario Molina, after six months of relative silence after the publication of their warning, went to the American Chemical Society and called for a boycott by citizens of hairspray and deodorant. So these are scientists that are active as scientists, they were right out there, and then the industry, fortunately, in a strange way, reacted so strongly against them that it sensationalized the news. And it spread across the world, and Susan mentioned some Nordic countries, the United

• 11:27Speaker 03

  States and Canada banned these products. And then to get to your question, even as the boycott began, there were companies that broke from industry and introduced the alternatives. And so there were pumps and sprays and Rollons and lots of alternatives, and then very quickly they found a new aerosol propellant that was not ozone depleting, and they introduced that. So you had this creative tension within the industry, within the aerosol industry, where some of the companies, S.D. Johnson and Mannan and others, were in favor of protecting the ozone layer, and they won against their competition, penetrated the market.

• 12:09Speaker 03

  The products were banned and as Susan mentioned, you hardly noticed that these product changes were occurring. And then later with the Montreal Protocol, it was a much more organized process. The part that I worked on with the Montreal Protocol was to evaluate technology, promote the best of the technology, and then, very importantly, to discourage the alternatives that were inferior in one way or the other. So they were very successful at not trading one problem for another and actually making overall improvement very quickly.

• 12:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So there's a lesson here that if you want to make systemic change, domestically or internationally, you gotta, for it to work swiftly and effectively, it's got to, you've got to sort of energize all parts of that beast or that machine that is, that ultimately is the force of change in this world.

• 13:10Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, money.

• 13:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, Chuck, okay.

• 13:13Chuck Nice?

  There you go.

• 13:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Sorry, that's the word, sorry.

• 13:15Chuck Nice?

  I, I, I, listen, you know, I, I understand. I have three scientists in front of me, you know, but I can say it, money. Like, that's what happened. We had the free market. You had some pressure by science. You had a portion of the marketplace say, "Hey, I'm going to respond." That creates competition. Then before you know it, it's like, "Hey, I don't want to lose any of this money." Forget, I'm spraying money away.

• 13:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, wait, so Susan.

• 13:42Speaker 02

  You know, you're right, you're right, Chuck, but you left out something really important, and that is people. The fact that people really cared about this issue. They actually understood and could perceive that the idea of having more ultraviolet light falling on them if there was less ozone. Everybody knows the ozone layer protects us from ultraviolet light from the sun. And we don't want to get, we get sunburned. It hurts, it's bad for us. We get skin cancer, we get cataracts, the plants get sick, you know, lots of bad things. People cared about it because they could see what was going on. So don't forget the importance of public interest. It's huge in any environmental problem.

• 14:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Otherwise, you're arguing in a void. And even if you're right, it would, it'd be difficult, if not impossible, to gain traction. Yeah, that makes me worry about future problems that don't have ways to get traction, yet they still need to be implemented for the survival of the species. Now you got me all worried.

• 14:43Speaker 02

  No, don't worry. Don't worry. Have you seen Greta Thunberg going out there?

• 14:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 14:49Speaker 02

  It is happening. It is definitely happening. The young people today are incredibly environmentally conscious.

• 14:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's true. I can't wait till they take over because the world we messed up. I mean, at what time in the history of the universe has the adult population ever said, "Can't wait till the young'uns take over to fix things"? That's never happened, ever. And we might be living in that for the very first time. We gotta take a break, but when we come back, we'll take questions from our fanbase, from our Patreon fanbase, because they all know, we have a scientifically literate audience, and so I think they'll be delighted to know they have access to the two of you. And Chuck, you've collated the questions. So when we come back, Cosmic Queries, mending the ozone layer, when we return.

• 15:49Speaker 04

  Hi, I'm Chris Cohen from Hallworth, New Jersey, and I support StarTalk on Patreon. Please enjoy this episode of StarTalk Radio with your and my favorite personal astrophysicist, Neil deGrasse Tyson.

• 16:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're back. StarTalk, Cosmic Queries, mending the ozone layer. Somebody had to do it. And so we got two people in the house, in the virtual Zoom house, who were under-celebrated for what it is they achieved. And it's time more people knew their names. I've got Susan Solomon, an atmospheric chemist, and Stephen Anderson, who has, who's spent a career...

• 16:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Worrying and thinking about sort of how to create sustainable civilization and what you need to do about that and making it something real rather than just something we've all imagined. And so here we are, and we've solicited questions from our fanbase.

• 17:09Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 17:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  About many of the ozone layers. So Chuck, what do you have coming up?

• 17:12Chuck Nice?

  You know, well, before we go, can I just ask, just so that people can know, because we do, Susan said it, you know, everybody knows about ultraviolet light and the ozone protects us from that. So can you guys just, I mean, all three of you or any of you, give us, how does that happen? Why does that happen?

• 17:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This might be the only thing I can contribute to this podcast. Go for it, Neil. So can I, can I take my stab at this? Absolutely. Okay, so the 21% of the air we breathe is oxygen and most of it is not oxygen, it's nitrogen. And so that oxygen itself is in a form of two oxygen atoms combined and we call it O2. O2, that's what we breathe, that's what sustains us. The nitrogen is, is just filler, basically, relative to our-

• 18:01Chuck Nice?

  It's the bread in our crab cake.

• 18:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Survival, it's filler.

• 18:03Chuck Nice?

  [laughing]

• 18:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, okay.

• 18:08Chuck Nice?

  Right, exactly.

• 18:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That'd be too much bread for my crab cake, actually. But, okay, so there's a form of oxygen that it has three oxygen atoms, and it's O3, and that's called ozone. And ozone has the property, which is if it, if you have ultraviolet light that strikes that molecule, that's sufficient energy to break the molecule apart back into oxygen and an O2. And so, so what, so you say what happened to the UV? It's gone! It goes into the kinetic energy of those two, of the two resulting particles. And so it's gone! So the ultraviolet from the sun, I get the right number from our two guests.

• 18:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ninety-seven, ninety-eight, ninety-nine percent of the UV from the sun does not reach Earth's surface because of the ozone. So even when you do get sunburned.

• 19:02Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 19:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's from the little bit that gets through after the ozone is trying to do its best. And so if you take out the ozone layer, that's the end of life on Earth as we know it, life on Earth's surface, because ultraviolet light and biology are incommensurate. Ultraviolet has enough energy to break apart biological molecules. How did I do, Stephen and Susan?

• 19:28Speaker 02

  You did great. You did great. I mean, at the very end, you said the key thing, which is that the UV light hitting your skin or hitting your eyes is enough to actually damage your DNA, and that's what causes, you know, cancer. So, so the only other thing that I would add is that every one percent change in the ozone layer is estimated to cause a two to three percent increase in skin cancer in light-skinned people. So it's not as much of a problem in dark people, but it's not zero problem either. And everybody's got the same problem with their eyes. It doesn't matter whether they're blue, or brown, or black.

• 20:12Speaker 02

  Your eyes will still be subject to cataracts because the light gets through and damages your retina. So it's not good news, and it's indiscriminate to, you know, whether you put the stuff up there or not. So it's happening all around the world.

• 20:28Chuck Nice?

  Finally.

• 20:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I gotta whisper something to Chuck. Chuck. Okay, wait, Chuck, Chuck. So it all got solved so quickly because of the white people.

• 20:38Chuck Nice?

  And I was gonna say, finally, finally, one good thing about being a black man.

• 20:45Chuck Nice?

  Finally.

• 20:48Speaker 02

  Well, don't. Don't be too sanguine Chuck. I don't want you to get cataracts and you still can.

• 20:55Chuck Nice?

  I wear sunblock every day, but not because I'm worried about UV rays. It's just because I wanna look good.

• 21:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You wanna glow. You wanna glow.

• 21:06Chuck Nice?

  I don't wanna age from the sun. Alright, well, listen. That was amazing. That was great. That was great.

• 21:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so what do you have?

• 21:14Chuck Nice?

  Samuel Case says, hello, big brains and Chuck. Uh, I, well, what can I do, right? He goes, I love you all and thank you for your gift of knowledge. I run a small AC company in Phoenix, Arizona, and I have been directly affected by legislation regarding climate change, in particular, the 2014 phasing out of HCFCR22. I was wondering if you could explain the actual effects of chlorine or refrigerant on the atmosphere itself? Thank you and for giving me this small opportunity to play a part in the exploration of our planet. This is Samuel Case.

• 21:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Very cool. So, so I guess the question is, what is actually going on up there? There's the ozone mining its own business, the O3 molecule. And now this jumbo chlorofluorocarbon molecule meets it. So now, take us through that.

• 22:12Speaker 03

  Yeah, let me, let me go through that because this air conditioning case is very interesting. He's absolutely right that HCFC22 depletes the ozone. It's also a greenhouse gas, powerful greenhouse gas. So here we have a refrigerant that was once used in every air conditioner of small size everywhere in the world. And then, under the Montreal Protocol, they're phasing out that chemical. The last uses are occurring in developing countries and for servicing of old air conditioning that hasn't been replaced. So the chlorine in this chemical.

• 22:47Speaker 03

  As Susan mentioned, migrates to the stratosphere, destroys the ozone, and harms people through these biological and other effects. And it also harms, as you know, materials on the surface of belt environment and also suppresses the human immune system. So this is an extraordinary environmental effect that in itself justified the Montreal Protocol. But the greenhouse effect from the refrigerant itself, which is the direct effect of that gas entering the high atmosphere and the like, was also serious. And then the third leg of that is the energy that's used for the air conditioner itself.

• 23:29Speaker 03

  Because until recently, that came from coal and oil and other polluting sources. And so this change that's occurring in Arizona at this air conditioning company has a broad advantage to society. Because the new refrigerants are safer, the ozone layer, they're lower in their direct effect on the climate, and the equipment itself is more efficient than the equipment that was sold historically. So it's a change for the company, and it's a heroic effort for an individual company to change the tools and the tanks and retrain the workers. But it's for the good of society. And we're just getting through that change from the Montreal Protocol. And now we're entering a new stage

• 24:13Speaker 03

  where the refrigerant he's using now, which is called HFC 410A, which is a blend of two of these chemicals that are ozone safe, is still a greenhouse gas. So we're making the change to a lower GWP, a less damaging refrigerant, and we're increasing the energy efficiency again. So this is a case of continuous improvement and innovation and the strength of the Montreal Protocol, that it just keeps giving the signal that you talked about, Neil, and you talked about Chuck, that there's the profit motive, and then there's also a tremendous amount of altruistic motive.

• 24:58Speaker 03

  Of companies that want to do better for Earth and their employees and their customers.

• 25:03Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 25:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, plus they get to advertise that, that they're environmentally preferred chemicals.

• 25:10Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 25:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So.

• 25:11Speaker 03

  They're serving the need.

• 25:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I love that. And your guys in Arizona, which last we checked.

• 25:16Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 25:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Sits a quarter mile from the surface of the sun. In the summertime. Earth's orbit swings just Arizona, real close.

• 25:25Chuck Nice?

  Samuel Case, you too can be a hero, man. Make the transition. There you have it. Awesome. That was great. Okay.

• 25:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, very good.

• 25:32Chuck Nice?

  Jeff Johnson wants to know this. Are we at the point of no return with runaway climate change? Are there any potential technologies that can reverse the effects?

• 25:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Susan, let me get you to respond to that because you, if you're an atmospheric chemist, you would be plugged into not only the causes and effects of our atmospheric transgressions, but also what could possibly be remedies to it beyond just, okay, stop what you're doing. All right. Is there some other sort of chemical geoengineering solution to what's going on here?

• 26:11Speaker 02

  Well, people have talked about geoengineering the planet. I mean, personally, I'm just not a fan of experimenting with systems that you don't understand very well. So, you know.

• 26:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Really? Yeah, yeah. Really?

• 26:26Speaker 02

  You know, yeah. You know, I don't volunteer for medical trials. I mean, it just depends on how you feel about risk. But, you know, the problem is that we can't, you know, we can't make a decision for the whole world just because some people want to go out there and go skydiving, right? I mean, some people really don't have the same values about risk that I do. So your feelings about geoengineering, I think, have a lot to do with how you are as far as risk averse or not. And I'm actually honestly pretty risk averse.

• 27:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But I can tell you that on Mars, where there is no ozone layer, as far as we've been able to measure, the surface of Mars is sterile. Because the UV light comes straight on down, and if we're ever gonna terraform Mars, we're gonna need some UV shielding, and we're thinking ozone, of course, but, um, so, whatever it is, the risks you want or don't wanna take, are things, somebody's gonna have to think about if we're ever gonna be two planet species.

• 27:33Speaker 02

  That's true, but at the moment, we don't really have a lot of species on Mars, as far as we know, do we? So, you know, not, not quite the same level of, you know, risk to life up there as there are.

• 27:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All, all life forms on Mars right now are robotic. It is the robotic planet of the ga- of the galaxy.

• 27:51Speaker 02

  I guess, aren't people still looking for, like, little tiny cyanobacteria or something? I mean, you know way more.

• 27:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Miccos, not on the surface, but there might be underground aquifers that would be shielded from the UV, and so there's some attempt to, uh, think about it on, on those terms.

• 28:08Speaker 02

  But, but, you know, when, when you, absolutely, but when you come to the Earth, and you talk about geoengineering, you gotta say, okay, well, maybe it's gonna change rainfall. Gee, you know, uh, the people who are already suffering from drought in, say, Australia, you know, they, they might not like that too much, you know?

• 28:26Speaker 03

  So, Chuck, can I answer that a little bit? So I would agree with the caller, that we're at the point of no return, and that it's pretty desperate. If you look at the IPCC report, or if you look at the wildfire fires in California, uh, we're close to the end of the time where we could make easy choices. So, right now, there's tremendous opportunity to phase down these HFCs I mentioned, that are controlled now under the Montreal Protocol. A big part of the, of the new opportunity is to, uh, phase down methane, get rid of, rid of the leaks of methane, and cut back on the exploitation, and these gases have a short-term, powerful effect on the climate.

• 29:09Speaker 03

  So if you, if you take out those chemicals quickly, then you won't find yourself as desperate as to require the kind of experimental geoengineering that you're talking about.

• 29:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Got it. That, that's an important fact here, the rate at which things change, yes.

• 29:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, but still, you know, I guess the question was about the runaway greenhouse effect idea, and I think that's conceivable, but honestly, there isn't too much evidence that we're close to that point right now. I said it's a different kind of irreversible effect. Yeah, that's Venus. That's Venus, and you know, that could happen if we kept going full bore pedal to the metal, but I just don't think that's gonna happen, given the kind of climate changes that we're seeing today.

• 29:57Chuck Nice?

  But is it safe to say that, putting the runaway effect aside, that climate change itself is kind of like a snowball rolling downhill, or a Mack truck on a gradient that a decline, and that as it picks up speed, it's much harder to slow down, and then once you hit the brakes, it's still gonna keep going forward, no matter what?

• 30:23Speaker 02

  You know, that's a misconception a lot of people have, Chuck. Yeah, let's see, where do I start with this? I guess what I'll say is, the thing that is rolling downhill fast is actually the development of the commitments that we human beings have to infrastructure that uses fossil fuels, which are the source of our CO2. So, the problem, and to me, it's, you know, it's hard to talk about it as a problem. I fervently believe that people in the developing world have every right to develop. You know, it is fundamental to their health, their, you know, their future, their education.

• 31:07Speaker 02

  Their longevity, yeah, everything. You name it, it's fundamental to life, to go for a developing world to continue to develop. And in order to develop... If they develop using fossil fuels as they get richer, as is now happening in our globalized society, then more and more power plants will be built and more and more cars will be bought. And the question is, are those going to be fossil fuel powered cars and fossil fuel powered, you know, coal powered, uh, uh, power plants? Or are they going to be clean energy systems?

• 31:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So that means you, you see the writing on the wall based on what the future institutional, uh, societal commitments are going to be in the coming decades?

• 31:51Speaker 03

  Right.

• 31:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And that doesn't look good to you?

• 31:53Speaker 03

  And let me just, let me inject here that the runaway, the runaway is that the momentum of technology has to be turned back very quickly because you can't turn it over quick. If you look at what you own, your house, your appliances, your cars, uh, the vacations you plan, all your property, this is, takes a long time to turn this over. So you've got to get an early start. And the part of the runaway I'm worried about is things like the melting Arctic and sea level rise and, and liberating the methane from the tundra and so forth. And those are real concerns that if you go too far with that, it'll be a long time coming back. And Susan's published this on the long life of carbon dioxide. These are extraordinary, difficult changes to make.

• 32:37Speaker 03

  The sooner you change, the better. And I think we're behind schedule on these kinds of commitments people should be making.

• 32:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. So what you're saying is we're all going to die. That's what you're saying. I can't believe I just laughed at that. I know. Right.

• 32:52Speaker 02

  Oh, that's what we do in our field all the time, Chuck.

• 32:55Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 32:56Speaker 02

  But I just want to say one thing, it's great to roll back methane and hydrofluorocarbons and all the rest of it, but let's not forget carbon dioxide is job one.

• 33:05Speaker 03

  Right.

• 33:06Speaker 02

  It's really our fossil fuel economy that, that is our problem. And, and you know, uh, if it distracts us from working on reducing fossil fuel use to work on methane, we, we should definitely not do that. Uh, we've got to be, got to be very smart.

• 33:23Speaker 03

  Different people. There's absolutely no overlap that you can do two things at once, right hand, left hand. Industry's got to get moving on all this stuff at the same time, or all these jobs will end up as job one or job, job last. So I would urge, I would urge all the readers and the listeners of this to investigate themselves, but we've got to get going here.

• 33:45Chuck Nice?

  Alright.

• 33:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We gotta take another break before our third and final segment. Chuck, I think we only got to like two questions.

• 33:50Chuck Nice?

  I know, this is...

• 33:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, we're gonna have to go like lightning round.

• 33:52Chuck Nice?

  We're gonna go quickly, okay.

• 33:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We'll do lightning round in the third segment. When we come back, Cosmic Queries, Mending the Ozone Layer on StarTalk.

• 34:14Chuck Nice?

  Hey, it's time for a Patreon shout out to the following Patreon patrons, Kyle W. Ordin and Frank Kotarski. Hey guys, thanks so much for your support. You know, we certainly appreciate you because you are helping this show happen. And anybody else listening who would like your very own Patreon shout out, please go to patreon.com/startalkradio and support us.

• 34:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We're back. Cosmic Queries, Mending the Ozone Layer with Chuck Nice. Chuck, your social media, Chuck Nice Comic.

• 34:56Chuck Nice?

  Yes, everywhere. Thank you.

• 34:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Everywhere. Good, good, good. And we got with us our unsung hero guests.

• 35:03Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 35:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Scientists Susan Solomon and Stephen Anderson, who are the recipients of the Future of Life Award.

• 35:10Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 35:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Given to people who you otherwise didn't hear about, but somehow managed to save the frickin' world.

• 35:17Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 35:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so, the fact that this award exists is kind of a weird... It's a weird fact, right? Because you'd think if someone saved the world, they'd be on the front page of every paper.

• 35:30Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 35:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But what it tells you is that there are scientists working behind the scenes in laboratories. There are people who are moving agencies and institutions so that, at the end of the day, an entire system has been shifted. And people don't tend to look at the contents of the sausage. They just eat the sausage.

• 35:50Chuck Nice?

  Exactly.

• 35:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Sorry to analogize.

• 35:52Chuck Nice?

  No, and you know what, Neil? What you just said, it makes so much sense. And this is one of the problems I have with you three and everyone in your industry, is that you quietly go about your work.

• 36:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Why do you quietly go about your work? All right. So we need, we have to hire like PR people. Yes. Attached to us. So Stephen and Susan, did they, this award, is it a physical thing? Or is it just some distinction that, that they hand you?

• 36:26Speaker 02

  Well, it is a tremendous honor and I, I just happen to have my plaque here. Yay. Which, which.

• 36:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, cool, cool. So we got a plaque.

• 36:35Speaker 02

  Extremely, extremely heavy.

• 36:37Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 36:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  For those only listening.

• 36:42Chuck Nice?

  That's great.

• 36:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, for those only listening, it's, it's a plaque, at least 16 by 20, it looks like. And, oh, it's gorgeous. It's completely gorgeous.

• 36:50Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 36:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And, and you have to, if you didn't have a mantle to put it over, you'd have to buy a house that had a mantle to put it over.

• 36:55Speaker 02

  I gotta find a really strong nail because this thing is so heavy.

• 36:59Speaker 03

  It's got the earth hanging at the bottom, too.

• 37:02Chuck Nice?

  Right. And right, and right underneath the earth, for those of you who are just listening, it says, "Thank you for saving the world."

• 37:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Now Chuck, how, how are your superhero characters coming along?

• 37:14Chuck Nice?

  Oh, yeah. So, uh, right now I have, uh, the real Captain Planet and Major Ecology.

• 37:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, there you go. Very nice, very nice, very nice.

• 37:23Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, we'll go with that. So, all right.

• 37:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, so we, we're still, this is a cosmic query, so we've only gotten through like two or three questions. Let's see if we can speed up our answers and get a little more in on this segment. So go for it, Chuck.

• 37:35Chuck Nice?

  Okay, so this is Nicholas Lenson, who says, "Hey there, in the book How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, Bill Gates proposes that we will only reduce carbon emissions if we cut the cost of what he calls green premium on every human activity. It sounds like a good framework. Do you think reducing the cost of cleaner alternatives would be enough to eradicate greenhouse gases and emissions released by human activity?" Which of course in the, in the last IPC, it said that, uh, that we are indeed the contributing factor here for, finally, we got to that.

• 38:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, we knew that, that's just, okay. So Stephen, let's direct that to you. So if, if we go back to the economic drivers that motivate people, we have green techno, green energy and non-renewable energy. And it's pretty clear to me that if green energy ever ended up... Physically costing less than non-renewable energy, you could change the world overnight. So where are we and where's that headed?

• 38:39Speaker 03

  The good news is that Bill Gates is right, that it's a tremendous advantage that the cost of electricity from wind and solar has come down. Many of you know that right now, that even if you own a relatively recent coal-fired power plant, it's less expensive to reinvest in solar and wind than to buy the coal for that power plant. It's especially true if you look at the downstream effects that you have to go through, cleaning up the coal mines, cleaning up the spoils, getting rid of the combustion byproducts. So that's happening today. And it's really just this dodginess of the infrastructure that Susan mentioned, the idea that you just have to get to work and change this over.

• 39:21Speaker 03

  And right now, you could look at somewhere, a case like New Orleans, I don't know if you noticed that the power grid failed during the floods. And one of the huge advantages of this distributed power from wind and solar, and especially when it's co-located in the cities, you can maintain electricity for critical service like medicine and communication and so forth, even when the power grid's down. So there's lots of co-benefits. If you look at the big institutions like the United States military, they're shifting very quickly to solar and wind and distributed power, and they're electrifying things that people couldn't imagine have been done in the past. So I think we're, I think that's the, one of the brightest spots, and Bill Gates is

• 40:04Speaker 03

  absolutely correct, that clean energy is a big part of the solution.

• 40:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Cool.

• 40:10Chuck Nice?

  Yeah. What we need is, what we need is a, a good country songs written about solar and wind. Because they got tons of country songs about coal miners, but you've never heard a country song that said, "My daddy was a solar array constructor." Like, you've never heard that.

• 40:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Very good point. In fact, I just reminded myself that that song from the 60s, "Big Bad John."

• 40:33Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 40:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Big. Remember that song? He, he worked in a coal mine. In fact, he died in a coal mine by the end of the song. Sorry to give away the... Spoiler alert. Sure, right. Jim and Dane, baked by Ed John. So, you're right, all these like, country songs of working in the coal. My daddy was a coal miner.

• 40:53Chuck Nice?

  His daddy was a coal miner. His daddy was a coal miner.

• 40:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Daddy's daddy. So, so, it would be really funny, a whole suite of songs. My daddy set up solar panels.

• 41:04Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 41:06Chuck Nice?

  So, yeah. All right, here we go.

• 41:11Chuck Nice?

  Fred Gibson wants to know this. What is the most, uh, what is the most life-changing adaption to our lives that we'll be forced to make due to our lack of resolve in dealing with climate change? And Fred is coming to us from Winnipeg, Manitoba.

• 41:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, this assumes that not all changes, this assumes not all changes will be smooth and easy and maybe we'll be forced by law or by other factors. Susan, what do you have?

• 41:43Speaker 02

  Well, we get to find out how tasty vegetables actually can be if you cook them correctly. You know, I mean, it's not the mushy peas that my mother used to serve us out of the can, right? Which made us all hate vegetables. But, you know, I'm personally, I'm a pescatarian. I eat fish and vegetables. And I never had such delicious vegetables in my life until I started really thinking about how to make them tasty and they're easy to make tasty.

• 42:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I keep thinking they should redo the Popeye cartoon series where he's looking for a spinach in the produce aisle and checking instead of squirting a can of boiled spinach into his mouth. That's a whole other outlook, right?

• 42:28Speaker 02

  Oh, man. No wonder we all hate them. I mean, you know.

• 42:31Chuck Nice?

  Stay right here, Bluto. I've gotta run to Whole Foods.

• 42:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay Popeye, but don't beat your alarm.

• 42:42Chuck Nice?

  Alright, okay, this is Asher Osborne, and Asher would like to know this. I've read that seventy-five percent of greenhouse gases are created by about one hundred companies. Is this true? And can the average individual really then make a difference?

• 43:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Good question. Is that you, Stephen?

• 43:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, I think that is. I haven't heard that statistic, but there are gigantic companies in the world, and certainly the hundred biggest companies would be a big part of the problem. I would just point out that those hundred companies are buying from ten thousand companies, and they're selling to billions of customers. So if you look at the whole spectrum of things, there's still a lot of room for everybody to do their part. And one of the things that's happening very quickly is the companies that have social responsibility are changing their product lines, they're changing their procurement, they're deciding that they should carbon-neutralize their total effect. So there's a lot of positive things going on.

• 43:48Speaker 03

  But it is, it is true that there are some giant companies that are standing in the way of climate protection. And they certainly have to be reckoned with, and that's, as Neil knows, that's a classic political problem.

• 44:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Susan, what does it mean to carbon-neutralize?

• 44:04Speaker 02

  To go carbon-neutral, or?

• 44:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, what does that mean?

• 44:07Speaker 02

  So it means that the, the amount that you generate is equal to the amount that you take away of carbon dioxide.

• 44:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Of carbon dioxide, so that way, whatever you do, you're not making the planet worse off.

• 44:21Speaker 02

  Right, right, so if you're going to, for example, go for a drive, you go for a drive in your electric vehicle instead of your fossil-fuel-powered car, and you make sure that you pay the extra for the wind source, you know, electricity, if it does cost you extra, but as we talked about earlier, just make it cheaper, and then you won't have to pay any extra for it, and that's where your energy's gonna come from anyway. So if then, if you are, if you still have a fossil-fuel car, you trade it in and get one of those cool new Teslas and just go roaring down the street.

• 44:57Chuck Nice?

  Okay. There you go.

• 44:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right, Chuck, keep it coming.

• 45:01Chuck Nice?

  All right, this is Helmer van der Rick. Uh, I think, uh, he says.

• 45:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You tried hard on that one, though.

• 45:11Chuck Nice?

  I tried, man. I tried, okay? I did the best I could, Helmer.

• 45:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 45:16Chuck Nice?

  Um, "Dear honored scientist, I am from the Netherlands and I'm pretty worried about the rising sea levels for obvious reasons."

• 45:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  As they should.

• 45:25Chuck Nice?

  As they should. Well, since your whole country is below sea level.

• 45:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The whole of the Netherlands means lowlands, I think, in, in, all right.

• 45:34Chuck Nice?

  Okay, he says, "But I got to thinking, Earth could become uninhabitable in many ways, some being more likely than others. In your professional opinion, what is the most likely cause for Earth to become uninhabitable?" And i- i- it sounds to me like this guy spends a lot of time being depressed.

• 45:55Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Stop.

• 45:58Chuck Nice?

  Because he's just thinking about existential threats all over the place. I mean, he can't get away from how are we going out?

• 46:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Susan or Steven, which of you thinks about the apocalypse most?

• 46:09Speaker 03

  You know, one of the things, one of the things that the Future of Life Institute is good for is taking on the hard problems. And so, one of the reasons I was so pleased to win this award is if you look at the list, it's, uh, nuclear and biological weapons, it's, uh, uh, changes in, uh, inappropriately applied technology of all kinds, and then now it's ozone and climate. So I think there's a whole spectrum. And the way I like to look at this, to remain optimistic, is if everyone did their job, uh, on ozone-depleting substances, greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, the people that are in charge of, of bringing peace to the world and so forth, you need all of that, because there's a lot of mechanisms

• 46:53Speaker 03

  that could devastate the United States and the rest of the world. I think everybody's gotta do their job.

• 46:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Chuck, so Steven has the complete list.

• 47:02Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 47:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Of what will do us in there.

• 47:04Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 47:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so Steven, what are you doing here? Get back to work.

• 47:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What are you doing here? We need you.

• 47:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Get back to your desk. All right, all right. Chuck, keep it coming.

• 47:17Chuck Nice?

  Okay. This is Cody Kloboski. And Cody wants to know this. Hello, all. The main thing I always hear from climate change deniers is that humans are not to blame for the increase in global temperatures. Can you please explain how we can prove the human responsibility?

• 47:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Accountability. Susan, how do you do that?

• 47:45Speaker 02

  Well, there's a lot of different ways. I guess the first thing I would say is, you know, the Arctic is getting warmer than the rest of the world, and we expect that. It's partly...

• 47:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, just to be clear. You mean it's temperatures rising faster than the rest of the world?

• 48:02Speaker 02

  There's been more warming in the Arctic.

• 48:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, but it's not actually warmer than the rest of the world.

• 48:06Speaker 02

  No, I'm sorry.

• 48:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That would be bad for Santa Claus.

• 48:08Speaker 02

  No, no, yeah, you're right. You're right. Excuse me, I misspoke. Yeah, so the Arctic regions are warming more because of global warming than other places. And if it was coming from the sun, it would be the tropics that would actually be warming more if it was like changes in solar activity. So that's not what it is. And, you know, it's not because the oceans in the Arctic are giving up heat, especially just there, because the oceans are actually taking up heat everywhere, because they're getting warmer, too. So unless you believe that there's magical other ways to make or destroy energy, which most...

• 48:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Which they do.

• 48:48Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, some people do. But, you know, Neil, your listeners are much more learned than that.

• 48:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Not our people. Yeah, we got our people know what's going on, what's going down.

• 49:00Speaker 02

  And, you know, you've got to have a source for that energy. If the whole planet is getting hotter and that the source for that energy is because we put more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

• 49:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So just to be clear, when the report, a report, says the temperature of the world has increased by one degree Celsius, that's an average? And it is lowest at the equator and higher than that at the poles. But people don't think that. And then we're melting, you know, glacier ice. And so maybe they should just give what the temperature increases at the poles. That would, that could, that might be more alarming to people than just the global average.

• 49:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a good, I think, two and a half times more.

• 49:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 49:44Speaker 02

  And the reason is because the ice retreats and then there's more heat coming in and being absorbed, so.

• 49:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, because the ice reflects sunlight.

• 49:53Speaker 02

  Because the ice reflects.

• 49:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, that's right. Right, right, right, right. So it's a runaway process. Chuck, we have time for like a half more question.

• 49:59Chuck Nice?

  Okay, great, because I saved this one for last on purpose. This is David Peterson. Hello, Dr. Tyson, Dr. Solomon, Dr. Anderson. When I was a child in the 80s and 90s, I remember the hole in the ozone layer being a very huge deal. The campaign to ban CFCs seemed to have been very successful in comparison to the campaign to fight global warming. What lessons can we learn from the ozone layer campaign? And apply them to the global warming campaign?

• 50:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I like it.

• 50:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. I'm writing a book that's exactly about this. And I'm gonna give it to you really quick.

• 50:33Chuck Nice?

  No, don't do that. Buy the book. There's your answer. Buy the book. No, go ahead. Go ahead, sorry.

• 50:39Speaker 02

  It's okay. You get it for free. So, uh, it's, book's not ready yet anyhow. It's, uh, it's, it's because people really cared. So you, you, the people have to care at least enough to vote and preferably to go out to your church or your social club and talk to other people and get them to care. It's political figures have to get interested and really want to try to do stuff. And, you know, Barack Obama, for example, really tried to do stuff. There were politicians who tried to do stuff back then. You gotta have industry playing their role and developing new technologies, which Stephen has done so much to, uh, to promote and make happen. And you gotta have good science.

• 51:23Speaker 02

  And you gotta have the economics all work out. And it can do so when all those factors align with one another. That's what happened, and that's how we solved the ozone problem.

• 51:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so to quote Chuck, money.

• 51:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  From an earlier, yeah, I mean, so it seems to me if I were to add to that, that if you really want to change people's hearts and minds, you have to pre-invent something that they could turn to. So they can take the off-ramp and not feel like they're somehow living a lesser life.

• 51:54Speaker 02

  That's part of it, but, but the, the other.

• 51:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But, but back to your veg, back to your vegetable analog. Yeah, you're right. If vegetables are only the side light to the T-bone steak on your plate, then no one's investing anything in making those vegetables tasty. But as vegetarians have done, and as, as vegans have done, if the vegetables become front and center and more attention is given. And so my wife and I are doing just that. We're celebrating vegetables in ways that were unthinkable growing up in this world. So I kind of think you need it there. Right. So they can say, well, what am I going to do? You're going to do this? Oh my gosh, it's cheaper and tastier and better. And then it happens immediately.

• 52:32Speaker 02

  That's true, but you know, you know what else is important is you got to realize that that steak is actually not good for you if you have it every night. You got the, no, really, you have to understand that the problem is serious and that you need to make a change. And, you know, if, if this year isn't convincing lots of people that it's serious and I don't, I, I just don't know what to say to those people, you know?

• 52:54Speaker 03

  I would like to say that Susan's right about that list, but the part the Montreal Protocol was very good at is that they worked where the rubber method wrote. They identified the technologies and promoted them a lot. And so if you compare the work at the IPCC and the work at the Montreal Protocol, Montreal Protocol named names, listed technology, gave references of where you could get it. So it was a much more publicly oriented system with a lot less bureaucracy. And I think getting the companies on board with the customers really closes the gap. And the 99 ozone depleting substances are 100 or so that were now 98% eliminated, which is quite a record.

• 53:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, Stephen, I, I'm delighted that you remain so optimistic.

• 53:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's true. For someone who's as close to the end of the world as the two of you have been, delighted to hear such a positive outlook. I think that means hope springs eternal and the human spirit may be what wins out in the end. After all, we gotta call it quits there. Susan, Stephen, it's been a delight to have you on the show. Congratulations for saving the world. When Chuck has his superheroes back, we'll invite you to comment on them to see if they capture what you did.

• 54:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  With authenticity. Thank you very much. And if they carry the right combination of superpowers. So Chuck, always good to have you here. Always a pleasure. All right, we're gonna call it quits there. Neil deGrasse Tyson here, your personal astrophysicist. As always, bidding you, keep looking up.