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we just spent half hour talking about this and I hardly ever talk about it why is that wrong I didn't say it was wrong okay I'm NE the grass Tyson world
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renowned astrophysicist turn TV host he's a man with the answers to the toughest questions on the planet and of
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course bestselling author in the last 50 years we've increased life expectancy 20
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years there will be a time where Homo sapiens have achieved escape velocity from Death that generation will never
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die unless you're hit by a bus that brings to you the question if you could live forever would
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you how different the world would be what are the things that you are most concerned about with the direction of
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travel of the human race a lot of things so there's some delusional Force operating on people's understanding of the world in which they live if you post an opinion on anything it gets attacked
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did you see what happened with Neil degrass Tyson he tweeted something that many people took great offense to part
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of what it is to be a scientist is is figure out all the ways you could bias yourself and remove them as far as
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possible don't let it interfere with objective truths but what's the personal toll on you I don't know why he tweeted
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that stupid and awful he's just a weird Twitter lunatic is a how long can I keep talking
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about but before this episode starts I have a small favor to ask from you 2 months ago 74% of people that watched
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this channel didn't subscribe we're now down to 69% my goal is 50% so if you've ever
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and the bigger the channel gets as you've seen the bigger the guests get thank you and enjoy this episode
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[Music] Neil I have always believed that to fully understand a person you have to understand their origin story maybe
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that's a a similar sort of analogy for the universe so the place I wanted to start with you is by understanding the most important context from your earliest years that are responsible for
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the person that is sat in front of me today wow this is a very Marvel Comics of you like what's the origin story of
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Superman Batman Spider-Man uh your question is very well-placed because everyone has been touched by some series of events unfortunately some
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for some people traumatic events but for all people some series of events that shaped who they are and I'd like to say
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that there was a series of events that planted the seeds of who I would become but I I wouldn't say that they were responsible I mean it requires a lot of
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continual investment of time energy and focus to shape a career rather than say oh it happened then and i' just been coasting ever since no that's not how that works
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so I grew up in the Bronx and in New York City surely as is true in London you don't have a relationship with the night sky in a
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busy City you at least in certainly in New York City there were tall buildings if you look up to see the sky there's a
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building in the way there's light pollution there's and back then there was air pollution so since no one has a relationship with with the night sky then one can ask what
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is your access to it of course it's our local planetarium the Hayden Planetarium and I my family my parents my brother and sister there was a
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tactical strategic thing my parents did I I didn't know it at the time but every weekend or every other weekend we went
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places we were exposed to all manner of things that talented adults do Beyond just the doctor lawyer you know engineer Beyond those standard
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professions so first it was entertaining but it also meant we had exposure to other ways of thinking about what you might do with your life one of
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those trips when I was 9 years old was to the Hayden Planetarium and I was Star Struck you sit in a big chair and the lights dim and the stars come out more
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stars than you can count and I thought it was a hoax I said aren't that many stars I've seen the
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night sky from the Bronx you're lying to me and only later would I learn upon going deep into the rural areas of the country we have relatives in the
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Caribbean we visited there I'd see the night sky as nature intended and to this day when I have access to Great telescopes on
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mountaintops and I look up at the crystall and clear night skies I still say to myself oh that is so beautiful it reminds me of the haen
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planetarian so it's a uh I know that's kind of a sad commentary on what it is to grow up in a city but it's I feel like the universe chose me
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and since I was nine years old onward I have committed my life to learning more and more about the universe and that
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that's the the most important seed that was planted sirel and Sunita is that your parents name sir is my father and Sunita is my mother correct what was the influence that they individually had on
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you from the from almost vicariously learning from them but also the direct influence they had on you
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they were a moral influence a cultural influence and I will add not that you explicitly ask this but I think it fits right in this moment um consider the period the
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1960s you could go one of two ways if you're an angry black man it's like you can raise your fist and threaten violence as a retaliation of the
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violence against you or you can find some other way that doesn't involve violence that
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involves some kind of Peace some kind of understanding and my father and while he
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grew up in the 30s and 40s he served in a segregated Army okay so this stuff he lived through and while I have my own stories none of them compare to his average story yet at the end of the day
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he was never bitter I remembered him saying when you look at the images of Angry white people screaming at black children entering a school who are
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protected by the National Guard because an edict had to be delivered to grant them access to education he would
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say they simply don't know any better they were raised that way you you want to hate them
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and my father never hated never so I go through life and at least several times a week every week of my
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life growing up I have stories today they would call them microaggressions but then it was just
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same different day but I never got bitter because you asked what influence did they have on me it was the non-bitter influence you
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say that's they don't know any better they think they're doing the right thing maybe we can make a difference
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going forward I saw the emotion in your face when you talked about your father yeah
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it's I think we need that today the world I I reached a point where okay how long can I keep talking about the
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universe and not bring it down to earth not bring some science principles to people's thinkings they want to to tribalize they want to hate they want to
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choose they want to create laws to restrict your freedoms Just Because of Who You worship or don't worship or who you sleep with or what you look like or what you know how
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reflective to light your skin color is right what side of a Line in the Sand you were born on I like invoking an alien Trope aliens
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they don't know anything about us they just see this beautiful planet with water on it and continents and clouds
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and they visit and they say oh this is cool oh there's this one species that's everywhere oh they're very successful
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they are humans and Homo sapiens and that's cool and then they get a little closer look and they say oh my gosh what
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are they there's a war over here why oh because there's some resource on this side that's not over there and they want
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it there's a coastline there's oil there's this there's a elements in a mine they they they they worship a
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different God they'll look at the violence and hatred that we commit upon each other and they'll run back home and tell their fellow alien Brethren there's no sign of intelligent
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life on Earth so anyhow so I've I've yeah my head has been in the stars but my feet have been on Earth my entire life why why why does that connect so
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deeply because it's so obvious it connects so deeply with you is that linked to what the resilience to
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bitterness that your father demonstrated when he was abused and was attacked with
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racial abuse is that is that the the reason why it's so linked so closely to your heart I I I don't know
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um he didn't he didn't burden us with his stories unless we asked or unless it came up in a moment was it wasn't that way it was I saw his Integrity in the
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face of what was going on in the world and it's you can a person could be a mentor even if they don't say
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anything because you can observe them observe their conduct their their behavior their how they respond to adversity do they fight
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back do they want to commit violence do they want to have a conversation to explore the differences you know I I am I'm a my
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mother's from Nigeria my dad's from England so I'm of I guess dual ethnicity or whatever the politically correct term
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is now it's called human okay I'm human it's called just say it repeat after what race are you you're the human race
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I'm the human race you you just spent 10 seconds telling me how anthropologists liked to divide up the world and force us to then agree with their categories line everybody up from Ghost
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white to Cole black and you'll have a human being of every single skin color in between okay oh did you happen to be
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born over there so you're a human tell me what mixture you are I don't give a rat's ass you're a human
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being sitting across the table from me now continue sorry sorry it's your podcast it's fine I don't mind I don't mean to jump all in your face it's fine it's fine I'm I'm fine with it um and i'
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I've come to learn about what it was to be black in the 1960s 7s from my guest and it's helped me to understand my mother better because I have to I have my mother
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didn't react like your father did you talked about mother was Nigerian Nigerian she came to the UK we lived in
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an allh area she didn't react like your father did and so it skewed my perspective on on race relations but
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then from doing this podcast and meeting people like you hearing some of those very specific stories of abuse I almost can't believe it and now I have this
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huge amount of empathy for my mother because I've sat here with the guests and one of the stories I heard you tell
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was about your father competing in athletics and how people would scream the nword at him while he was running oh
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yeah so that this was for me one of the most in ightful lessons that I got from all the stories from him yes so he uh he was a
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an athlete actually world class track uh that's its own story because he he was uh kind of muscular all right certainly in his day not Charles Atlas muscular
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but relative to other kids in his class in high school he was muscular and they were in their gym class and you line up and getting ready for the next all right there was gymnastics and then
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there was like track and field so they had the track unit and the gym teacher pointed to my father on the line and said we're about to do the running unit and just so you
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know um do you see sirel Tyson over there then turns he says he has the kind of body that would not make a good runner and he said to
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himself no one is going to tell me what I can't do in this world and he started running and he became world class and at
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one point he had the fifth fastest time in the world in his special event so that was that's an important lesson career lesson why are there people
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running around telling you what you can't accomplish in in a free Society I can get it if we're not a free
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Society but why should anyone tell you what you can't or shouldn't do so that was lesson number one for me but then his best friend also a
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runner Johnny Johnson was his name uh there's a race Johnny Johnson is running around on the last turn of the track and there's a runner from the New
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York Athletic Club several Paces behind him the coach of that Runner goes up the
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side of the track and screams to his Runner as he points to Johnny Johnson ahead of him catch
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that Johnny Johnson overheard this okay and all Johnny Johnson said to himself was this is one he ain't going
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to catch just and increase the distance okay so so that comment from the coach could have done one of two things it could have demotivated you because
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then you wallow in the racism of the world or it could motivate you to succeed ever since I heard that story every racist encounter I have ever
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had simply motivates me to succeed all the more period And I see that throughout your story as you go through you know College University um and you
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go into your postgrad there's moments over and over again where people or circumstance encourage you away from
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what's clearly your passion the thing you're clearly pursuing yeah people didn't yeah and again this is not the
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kind of racism that the 1950s or 40s you know I wasn't lynched you know so so again I don't want to claim equal I'm trauma to what earlier Generations had
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experienced but you can get let's call it institu racism even racism I'm talking about people trying to put you
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off your passion telling you it's not calling that racism what I'm saying is they see that I'm athletic I was
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athletic most of my life and they can't wrap their head around me being something other than an athlete that they watch on television when I say well I actually like astrophysics but you're so good at
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this other sport no I want to be in the physics Club no we we need you on the the basketball team and they think they're doing me a favor they think they're saying nice things to
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me but every one of those is a force operating against my ambitions and so in a way just that my skin color in my life's Arc was a path
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of most resistance compared to where I wanted to land and by the way I don't you we're we we just spent a half hour talking about this and I hardly ever talk about it I don't talk about because
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I don't you know I don't need to maybe if it's a counseling session but I'm perfectly fine I'm a happy guy happily married got two kids
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and uh I hardly ever talk about skin color because I I want to make it irrelevant as quickly as I possibly can in every
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context I'm possibly in so if you're going to invite me to give a public talk in February black history month I will decline that invitation if you only think of me as a black
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scientist then I have failed as a scientist period period uh you want me to oh what do and you know how I realize this okay
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so I will tell you the moment after which I was a different person interacting with the public okay I'm in graduate school there's an explosion on the Sun
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and the Press it's over the wires press hears about this so they want to get a comment on it an explosion on the Sun so
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they called Columbia the department of astronomy and they're looking for some it was lunchtime they were all out to
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lunch I'm a I'm a grad I'm a doctoral candidate I'm there for my PhD and so the department uh admin is going through the the roster and they get to me say
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Neil no one is here can you take this call so I said sure and they said hello who are you I'm Neil degrass Tyson doctoral candidate in astrophysics they say you know there's an explosion on the
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sun should we be worried I oh it's a solar flare they happen with some frequency it's a wave of particles coming towards Earth and they said you mean the Earth is fine I said the Earth
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is fine and they said can you tell us that on camera I um sure okay we'll send up a
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limo to pick you up in a half hour and so the whole conversation there it was and it was pre-taped I get home I put on the TV and I watched this
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interview and I had an outof body experience I just witnessed something I've never seen before in my life and
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you know what that was it was the news interviewing a black person me who was not an Entertainer or athlete okay interviewing a black
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person for expertise that had nothing to do with being black the interview didn't say at the end well how do black people feel about solar flares oh does this AFF affect
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dark skin differently none of that it was will Earth be safe and he's getting that expertise from a black person I never seen seen that then I thought well is it just cuz I'm on TV and I'm a
00:21:01
little more aware so I watched for the next two years every time there was a black person brought onto the news for
00:21:08
expertise it was someone who's a a member of Congress representing a community and they want Enterprise zones for the economics there was someone who was worried about the poverty in the
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inner city never had an audience seen a black person as an expert oh that they would have attorneys but it's talking about a court case about a
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black person would they ever being a black attorney to talk about a court case about a white person
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no and I said to myself that is the answer that's how I we turn an entire world of people who think black people
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are just dumb and stupid lazy shiftless and all they can do is shine my shoes and entertain me and sing and be the
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athlete on the field if there was an ever a force to change that it's not people telling them they should think differently it's me being visible in a
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way where they have no other choice but to say oh my gosh this person knows more
00:22:15
about this subject than I do and he has dark skin so the next time they see a homeless black person they're not saying oh black people are just like they have to confront the fact that they just saw
00:22:28
a black person tell them that Earth was safe so it's just quite simple the next time you're driving your car and somebody comes up with a squeegee to wash your window at the red light and
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begs for money and if that person is black maybe you'll think twice about the causes and effects of poverty of the forces that operate that
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discriminate against one community of people versus another so ever since that moment I have declined interviews that want me because I'm
00:23:07
black and even in this interview I'm not entirely comfortable spending a half hour talking about it because it it
00:23:16
turns this interview into something about me being black which then is someone hears or hears me for the first time oh let's get him he has all these stories about being black let's get him
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to talk to this group about in this racial uh in this race conference no I will decline that invitation so let's talk about um a
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separate Point what advice would you give me on how you pursue the thing that sets your heart on fire your passion or whatever you want to call it without falling into the OR conforming to the
00:23:50
like external pressure to become a doctor or lawyer like I'm thinking about the people that are watching this that have a passion but they don't consider
00:23:55
it to be a job as many people didn't consider what you you do now to be a job back then and they're being forced by
00:24:01
the external words parents expectations social media to go and do something else they don't want to do what would you say
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to those people I can tell you this that if you don't have a I didn't realize when I was
00:24:13
nine how unusual it was to be that passionate that young not until I got to college half the people my freshman year didn't yet know what they wanted to major
00:24:25
in and I said I'm majoring in astrophysics say was that cuz it was early in the catalog alphabetically of
00:24:32
things you might major no I've felt this and known this half my life and so I I in college I was sensitized to people who were still looking still
00:24:46
searching well we have the benefit of longer life expectancy today than 50 years
00:24:52
ago I mention this only because if you don't know want to be if you don't know what you want to be when you grow up and
00:24:58
you're 30 that's just fine but I don't want to have to blame you for not exposing yourself to what you can be when you grow up if you're sitting home watching football and say I don't know
00:25:12
what I want to do with my life why you do what my parents did visit a new thing every weekend go on a trip talk to experts in all manner of tasks and uh
00:25:24
you know visit a chef School visit a uh a g biology uh Expedition do just do things and if you like it you'll probably be better at that than anything
00:25:38
else you choose to do because you you will invest even your downtime doing it and as the saying goes pick something you would do for
00:25:50
free and make that your career and you'll never live a sad day in your life so so that's one variant on pick something that you
00:26:03
love and all the time when other people say you know I need a vacation from this job you you're gonna say vacation what's
00:26:08
that and people say that to me do you want a vacation from from what from the astrophysics you're doing but I like what I'm doing if I'm on vacation on bye I love being on the beach but if I'm on
00:26:20
the beach I'm thinking about the universe it's not to get away from the universe all right not that that could
00:26:27
literally happen anyway uh so uh that's what I would say you want to be independent-minded listen to people's comments people have life experience don't ignore it but what you
00:26:38
want to do is fold it in to your own sensibilities provided you have sensibilities to begin with otherwise
00:26:45
you become this pingpong ball batted back and forth between one person's suggestion and
00:26:51
another in the cover of your book um it talks about the polarization that we're we're seeing in the world at the moment what is you know as you what is the what are the things that you are most concerned about when you think about the
00:27:04
direction of travel of the human race and life here on Earth and what's going on what are the things that trouble you
00:27:09
at a very deep level in terms of our direction of travel a lot of things so let me put this in context in science if I put a conclusion
00:27:23
forward it's not you're not going to ask me did you look at both sides of that no that's not the question it's did you look at all sides of it we have this binarity mind where we
00:27:35
think are you form are you for us or against us is it black or white are you a boy or you a girl is it up or is it
00:27:41
down this is intellectually lazy because practically everything that exists in this universe manifests on a spectrum so here's a Here's a thought
00:27:53
and you're going to say well did you look at both no I looked at all sides did you realize that if this changes
00:27:58
that could change this and did you did you figure out how sensitive it is to that if I didn't I'm not doing my job as
00:28:05
a scientist okay so we live in a time especially fractured by the forces of social media I say this only because if
00:28:15
you post an opinion on anything in social media it gets attacked you there'll be
00:28:22
people who agree with it fine but the noise and the fireworks are when you get attacked
00:28:29
I don't think it used to be that way I think there was a time when I would Express an opinion and you
00:28:37
say oh that's interesting here's my opinion so why do you think that way and here's why I think that that's
00:28:43
interesting I never thought about it that way cool you you spend 15 minutes talk com comparing and contrasting
00:28:50
opinions then you go out for a beer at the pub this is how I remembered it am I misremembered I I I don't think so to you be attacked now what are the
00:29:03
consequences what do you actually after by attacking someone with a different opinion oh I know what it is you want
00:29:10
everyone to have exactly the same opinion you do well that's not this country either no you know what's on our
00:29:22
currency on our currency e plur blit Unum okay out of the many we have one not out of the one we have one it is the many it is the plurality
00:29:38
plaus plur it's Latin okay a plurality means people coexist who think differently about the world and we celebrate that or at least we ought to otherwise we're all the same and we can
00:29:51
make a country where everybody's the same and that's called a dictatorship is that really what it really
00:29:59
think through fully the consequences of that are you let me get back to the violence part I want to just on the on
00:30:04
the point of social media you had a you had a tweet that you did that went viral that got attacked right I mean there
00:30:10
there was one in particular that I think was was attacked more than the others I can't even remember off the top of my
00:30:15
head it's never my intent yeah to post a tweet that gets attacked of course if it
00:30:21
gets attacked it's like I didn't see that coming I I'm I count myself as an educator among the ranks of Educators
00:30:27
and my goal is to Enlighten and educate not to anger people so I still maintain a forbidden Twitter file yeah on my computer these are tweets that no I'm
00:30:39
not going to post it even though it's true objectively true it would be too upsetting to people is there another way
00:30:45
so anytime that happens like oh my gosh okay let me see if I can tune that differently next time but if you know
00:30:51
it's true and you believe it's important you still might not post it because it might upset people in ways that are not
00:30:59
productive give me an example no no I I will quote my father okay it's not good enough to be
00:31:06
right you also have to be effective if you're not effective go home doesn't matter if you are in the right so if I post something that just
00:31:20
creates more divisiveness I need to find another way to achieve the same goal without the conflict so no I'm not just about put
00:31:31
the truth out there and if it if it if it triggers land mind so what it's the truth no that's not being an educator I'm really there's a point here I really want to answer for my for my own
00:31:42
something I've been thinking a lot about as we see this polarization in every facet of conversation and public discourse I've started to think that
00:31:49
maybe the antidote is the very few amongst us that have the guts to stand by the truth regardless of the hours
00:31:55
they take and I'm seeing that a little bit with some big commentators I sh name names cuz that'll be a headline but um
00:32:02
I'm thinking actually they're like their their bravery I guess and their courage to say the truth regardless of the fact
00:32:08
they're going to get piled on because it doesn't fit the narrative is actually helping us it's helping us almost
00:32:15
um yeah it's it's helping it moves the needle a little okay so I I see that I'm just saying I believe however delusionally that you can achieve the same go
00:32:28
without angering people and part of the goal of that book is to offer ways to think about points of conflict in fresh ways that do
00:32:43
not trigger people to dig their heels in and fight more ferociously to defend their opinions now I want to put this in context because I started out by
00:32:55
describing an idea and you're say did you consider both sides no I considered all
00:33:02
sides um people want to think we're in the most violent times okay we look at violence against trans the trans Community First there was always
00:33:13
violence against trans people nobody was talking about it because there was violence against other people there were
00:33:20
violence against black people there was violence against women there's there's a whole list of people who were more rep
00:33:28
resented statistically in the world than trans people where we went through periods of our social justice Arc to try
00:33:39
to rectify those problems and so the fact that trans rights are on the table now is itself a measure of
00:33:54
progress because we're not talking about gay marriage anymore we're not talking under President Clinton one of our more more Progressive liberal presidents do you know what the the the the thing was
00:34:06
it was gays in the military don't ask don't tell that was considered a progressive stance in the 1990s under a liberal
00:34:18
president don't ask don't tell now in Qatar with the with they they say we will welcome uh gay people but don't
00:34:31
exhibit the gayness in the stands and everyone is jumping all over them for that regressive
00:34:39
posture it's exactly what we were 30 years ago don't ask don't tell I don't mind if
00:34:47
you're gay just don't kiss another man in front of me if you're a man I'm otherwise okay with it all right so what I'm saying is
00:34:58
look at the other things that preceded it and you can declare progress having led up to it that's my point not that it's still you don't still have to worry about it and it still needs Solutions
00:35:10
and you still have to somehow change people's sense of what equality is and equal access and opportunity and equity and inclusion that all still needs to
00:35:23
happen but that is not happening now or less so with black people so there are measures of progress that are kind
00:35:33
of perverse but real and you know what my father used to say he said I'll know we've achieved equality when a black person can be
00:35:46
indicted for embezzlement of funds when a black person can be sent to jail for embezzling $500 million I know we've made it okay okay like I said it's a
00:36:01
perverse measure but it's it's another way to think about the progress that has actually happened in this world all I'm saying is we may be living in some of the
00:36:15
safest times there ever was in the history of civilization I don't think we should
00:36:22
lose sight of that people are afraid to say it I think because the worry and it's an auth an a legitimate worry that
00:36:29
you might just get complacent and sit back and say see everything is fine it requires no more work and no more
00:36:36
effort I'm saying maybe we should pick in addition to worrying about the violence that persists to this day we
00:36:48
should look at the successes and say well what did we do right let's do more of that and there's not much of people saying
00:37:00
look how far we've come let's list how we achieve this why don't people do that why don't why AR they I saw a poll on Twitter two days ago and the question was do you it was essentially do you feel optimistic about the future I
00:37:12
clicked yes and I was in the tiny minority and 78 roughly 70% of people I think it was slightly more felt
00:37:19
pessimistic about the future I were worried and fearful about the future right and there's here's another
00:37:24
statistic which is in the spirit of that but it's a little more more thorough it
00:37:29
was a Gallop poll one of I forgot which one it might have been a different one but one of the official polling agencies
00:37:35
uh for the past 30 years have asked people each year in the United States um are things more dangerous for you just in your community in in your
00:37:50
this year than last year 27 of those years people said it's more dangerous this year than last year I don't feel as safe as I did last year okay now let's
00:38:04
plot the crime rate over the past 30 years it has been a precipitous drop just drop there's some bumps in there but basically it has dropped for
00:38:16
30 years since the basically the 1980s 90s up until today so there's some delusional Force operating on people's understanding of
00:38:28
the world in which they live and then people wanted to blame it I think in part correctly on local
00:38:35
news what's the first thing you see you put on not the national the local news um there's a crime committed and now we
00:38:42
have video you know we didn't used to have surveillance video now you see the person beating up on the old person or
00:38:48
the person breaking into the jewelry now you see it you say oh my gosh um you know clutch your love your
00:38:56
loved ones and you're valuable our ability to show you violence is greater than ever before and it affects
00:39:03
us emotionally part of what it is to be a scientist is to figure out all the ways
00:39:09
you could bias yourself and remove them as far as possible as much as you can what is the scientific method if not I give my own wording of the scientific method it's simply do whatever it
00:39:25
takes to not fool yourself into thinking something is true that is not or that something is not true that is so I so that poll would have told me
00:39:39
I'm gon to look at the actual data and I'm gonna look at and and I'm going to react to the actual data not to my
00:39:45
feelings about an objective truth nothing wrong with feelings it's the source of the greatest art in the world
00:39:53
then it's our emotions how we feel for people but if you're going to make legislation if you're going to act on your feelings
00:40:00
and there's an objective truth that informs those feelings that's the path you should take
00:40:06
otherwise we're a house of cards that could collapse at any moment because somebody feels like you're going to harm
00:40:13
them or they feel like it's dangerous or they feel like you excuse me I love human feelings but don't let it interfere with objective truths don't let it interfere with legislation laws
00:40:28
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platform your documentary Cosmos I don't know if I'm saying that right Cosmos Cosmos I think it's a might be an
00:42:45
English you're a Brit I don't know or care how you pronounce anything it's our langage so Cosmos Cosmos okay you will
00:42:51
never find an American correcting British pronunciation happens we just don't know okay um so objective truth
00:42:57
and and reality and feelings one of the things I learned from that documentary which was honestly I I remember the day
00:43:02
I found it I shouldn't say this but I didn't have a lot of money so I found it on some like dodgy like pirated website
00:43:08
and I just I watched I think it was eight episodes security I watched them all that night
00:43:15
and I and then I went back and watched the previous one with KL Sean um it just captivated me and it has ever since I
00:43:21
actually would cite that as my as the start of my fascination with the universe and one of the really profound
00:43:28
things I took from it when we're talking about objective truth and feelings is there's a scene in in the documentary
00:43:33
where you kind of like zoom out and it keeps going and going and going and going and going and going and it made me
00:43:40
talking about objective truth and feelings it made me feel so insignificant I realized that I am
00:43:46
objectively irrelevant and that was a wonderful feeling because with that it strips away the the burden of your own
00:43:54
self-importance and ego um do we matter so the cosmic perspective is incompatible with your ego okay I should say your ego is incompatible with the
00:44:05
cosmic perspective that's the proper way to order that sentence the cosmic perspective shows you how small we are in size in time in
00:44:20
space and if you go in with a high ego you might resist that you might say no I'm important I but I think of it
00:44:32
differently the we know one of the greatest Gifts of modern astrophysics to civilization dare I call it a gift is the knowledge that the atoms of
00:44:45
your body are traceable not only to the Big Bang origin of the universe itself but
00:44:53
especially two stars that manufacture captured those elements and later in their lives on death exploded scattering that enrichment across gas
00:45:06
clouds so that their next generation of stars would have planets and on at least
00:45:13
one of those planets life so we are not just figuratively we are literally Stardust so when you go out and look up at the night
00:45:30
sky yeah your urge is I'm small and that's large and yes you're alive in this universe but there's another way to look at it the universe is alive within
00:45:44
you you have kinship with the cosmos that feeling to me is greater than any ego you could have possibly walked into
00:45:58
the room with first that feeling borders on spiritual second third we have trained ourselves to
00:46:13
equate being special with being different you're special you do something think some way that no one else does so I'm special well let me turn that on a its
00:46:27
head and say maybe we're special not because we're different but because we're the same all humans are
00:46:41
Stardust all humans share a chemistry with all a biology with all other life on Earth there's one Genesis on this Earth
00:46:54
we have DNA in you have DNA in common with a banana I beg your pardon you can ask well where are the arms and legs no DNA goes deeper than that DNA controls chemistry it controls
00:47:08
metabolism it controls all kinds of things that are prescribed in the DNA and that's where we have commonality
00:47:15
with other life forms on Earth so why not look around and say I'm not special because I'm a different I'm special because I'm the same as you as
00:47:27
others as the tree as the brook as the animals you know the Woodland creatures and we can all sit here and look up at the night sky and say yes we have
00:47:39
kinship with the cosmos I feel large because of that not small you mentioned the pursuit of happiness earlier when you're talking about one of the central sort of like doctr doctrines of the American dream
00:47:52
that pursuit of of happiness and um in and in what you've just said about the Universe I was I was pondering where meaning is derived from so I kind of ask the question at the same time this
00:48:03
happiness and meaning where does where does that come from in in your perspective what I have found is there's an urge people
00:48:14
have to search for meaning is it under this rock behind metaphorically right is it under a rock I'm going to search is there meaning there is it behind a tree
00:48:28
is if if I join this group will that will be will I find meaning with them if I and I think okay go ahead but what you're doing is relegating meaning in
00:48:39
your life to a search and suppose you don't find meaning that'd be a force of disappointment in your life you're setting yourself up to be
00:48:51
disappointed if you don't find meaning so H I have another idea I I use this for myself I may or may not work for others I recognized long
00:49:05
ago that in a free Society where I'm not enslaved and I'm not you know an indentured servant and I have some freedom of choice that I have the power to
00:49:18
manufacture meaning in my life I can make decisions about my own life that create the meaning for me a meaningful life is learning
00:49:32
something new tomorrow that I didn't know yesterday otherwise it's a wasted day you know the prisoner who who puts x's in the boxes on the wall for the day they get out I have that in my head and
00:49:45
the day that I get out is the day I die all right and what these boxes remind you of is every day you're alive you're
00:49:53
one day closer to death so there's one fewer days in there to accomplish something that you might have wanted to accomplish
00:50:05
so I want to keep learning about our world about each other about things I don't otherwise know about and there are people who only read
00:50:18
things that they agree with or that they already know about or that it's they're
00:50:23
they're feeding some herb to be uh what's the word to be validated I have books on my shelf at my
00:50:39
bedside every book is a subject that I either know nothing about or I completely disagree with going into the
00:50:47
book I said maybe it'll change my mind learn new ideas okay I once presented that list to the New York Times when they they said cuz I my book was doing well at one
00:50:59
point and they try to get authors to talk about other books to keep the the book Wheel turning because fewer people
00:51:06
are reading today so what books are you reading so I on your shelf so I listed the books one of them
00:51:13
was uh a book in it in its 30th printing or something it was originally written back in the early 60s I think maybe even the 50s a book by Barry Goldwater it's
00:51:24
called the conscience of a conservative and so I'm reading this and people wrote
00:51:31
to me after they saw this listen they said I didn't know you're closet conservative I didn't know you're really
00:51:37
a republican did you vote for Trump and all of a sudden people were presuming that if I'm reading a book on something that book must be what my whole life is about rather than it's a portal to
00:51:47
another place of how people think and what people do so that shocked me actually that because that tells me that most people must have just books that continue to feed their own interests and
00:52:01
that is the best way to not grow in this world so one of my measures of meaning is how much more do I know about the world tomorrow than I did yesterday because almost any path you take take
00:52:15
will make you wiser as a person so I value wisdom that gives meaning to my life A New Perspective it's not just knowledge no what is the arc it's it's
00:52:28
there's there's data data can become information information on further study becomes knowledge and after enough time when you see how the knowledge plugs in
00:52:42
and applies it can become wisdom wisdom is the distilled essence of all the details the wisest statements ever spoken to
00:52:55
you generally have no detail in them at all do they it's I've heard it said this way wisdom is what's left over after you've forgotten all the details it's the
00:53:08
distilled essence of it all so I want to be wiser on the porch on my rocking chair I don't want to be the old kudin in my day we did it best no I don't want
00:53:20
to be that guy no so that's one source of meaning another and it's directly traceable to my parents but I'd like to also think it's traceable to Common
00:53:33
Sense is spend a little bit of your life lessening the suffering of others I don't mean redirect your life some people do they work in soup
00:53:48
kitchens and start not for profits to Ser yes I I I'm not that person no cuz my the universe is is what calls me but in my day in in a week do something that
00:54:03
lessens the suffering of someone else however trifling that gesture is and that's an
00:54:17
infusion of good yeah I'm value judging it I'm saying yes it is a good thing to lessen the suffering of others I'm yeah I'm declaring that I try not to ever put
00:54:29
opinions out there but it's my opinion that if you lessen the suffering of others you make a better world and don't we all want to live in a
00:54:42
better world if your happiness were a recipe right consisting of various ingredients that needed to be present in certain quantities for you to be a happy person
00:54:55
and under the assumption that you know no one is perfectly happy under any kind of vague sense of the word what what is
00:55:01
missing from your list of ingredients at the moment or what could you have more of
00:55:07
that would make I don't think of life that way okay how do you think of Life how why is that wrong that question I didn't say it was wrong I don't value
00:55:14
judge okay it's not what's right or wrong here it's it's um I don't live life that way
00:55:24
because it means you carry with you the emotions I could be happier if I were doing this and how come I'm not and all of a sudden well then I must be miserable if I'm not as happy as I could be no I don't measure dayto day am I
00:55:38
happy or not I I it's not the measure yes it it's in there but that's not the metric the metric is am I
00:55:50
successful at what at what I'm doing am I no no it's not even that it's am I as good at this as I can
00:56:03
be if you're not going to try to improve go home find something else so I remember in my first interview on National
00:56:17
Television a new planet had just been discovered around another star an exop Planet it was Banner headlines 5,000 in the catalog but back then 1995 it was Banner headline another
00:56:32
planet and we kind of always knew they'd be out there we just didn't have the tools to figure it out uh NBC News sent
00:56:39
an action cam up to the Planetarium I was freshly appointed as director they didn't know me as a person but I carried
00:56:46
title and so the Chiron on the TV image gets to say Neil grass Tyson director Aiden planetarium okay they came up and interviewed me tell us about this new planet how was it discovered right so I
00:56:58
gave my best professorial reply best oh my gosh it was there's a Doppler shift the the orbiting planet um influences the position of the star in
00:57:10
space it's not just the star sits there fixed in the universe and planets orbit it they both orbit their common center
00:57:17
of gravity and so the St you can't see the planet it's too dim but you look at the star and the star is jiggling back
00:57:23
and forth and I motion that with my body and I said and you measure this movement back and forth with the Doppler shift
00:57:29
you calculate it and you can infer the existence of this planet and B Bing it's a planet and I went on I went on for
00:57:37
like probably four times that length with my Pro and then I go home it's national news I get to call everybody
00:57:43
hey everybody my friends in California I'll could be on TV check it out and so when the segment
00:57:51
aired all they showed was me jiggling my hips like this and say it's a planet and I said oh they don't want my professor reply
00:58:03
they want a reply that fits in their medium a soundbite medium so let me practice that so I went home and stared in the mirror and had
00:58:14
people just shout out objects names places people things and I assembled sound bites for each one of them it's
00:58:20
like three sentences it's got to be informative makes you smile a little bit and the information has to be tasty so that you want to tell someone else
00:58:31
that's a sound bite okay we could do that now mention anything in the universe just just not a question just a
00:58:38
word just anything Mars Mars o do you know Mars is red because it's rust it's a rusted planet and rust has the color of red the whole planet because there's a lot of iron on Mars and red is the
00:58:55
color of blood hence Mars the God of War it might have life there we're still looking bum sound bite Venus okay Venus
00:59:08
the goddess of love and beauty and Venus as an object in the night sky is Stupify
00:59:15
andly brilliant until you learn it's has a runaway greenhouse effect and it's 900
00:59:21
degrees Fahrenheit 500 degrees Celsius on its surface it would vaporize you so much for the love and beauty and Venus so it's it's the least explored Planet
00:59:35
because of how hostile it is to our space probes boom we got this I'm not giving you a 10-minute lecture on the thermodynamics of Venus so my point is
00:59:48
when I saw that what I did did not serve the needs I invested a lot of energy so that I could be exactly what they needed so that their task is simplified
01:00:02
and I be get better at something that could serve a greater good I'm not I don't want to say that's happiness I'm
01:00:09
going to say that's fulfillment of an objective where I improved in what it is I was doing I
01:00:16
have to say when I knew I was going to meet you this question which was so front of mind for me is there is so many
01:00:21
people that talk about the stars in the universe but there's only one you and what I mean by that is yeah I don't know
01:00:27
what you mean by that what what so would I have had anyone else on this podcast that talks about the stars in the universe no the reason why you are a dream guest is because you create a
01:00:39
bridge through exactly what you've described making it engaging and interesting and uh fun and exciting because of the way that you communicate and like people
01:00:52
don't often think about this whether they're computer programmers or they are archaeologist or whatever that it's
01:00:58
great to know stuff but like I think Ricky Javas makes the joke with a daddy longlegs where he says you can have all
01:01:03
the venom in the world but if you don't have the the teeth to inject the Venom if you don't have the skill of like
01:01:09
communication and storytelling and engagement the Venom is pointless so what I will say is uh I will give one
01:01:17
other example and I'll tie a bow on it uh the first time I was invited to appear on The Daily Show which a very popular ComEd news program in the United States uh
01:01:29
hosted by um John Stewart John Stewart is a comedian he's brilliant he's very into current events we will know him he's sharp and I've seen politicians get
01:01:43
interviewed by him and they want to deliver their stump speech and they're deer in the headlights because he's just
01:01:49
dancing circles around them and on my first interview I said I am not going to be the deer in the Headlights okay so I
01:01:57
studied his show with a stopwatch and I said how many seconds does he on average
01:02:04
does he give his guests to speak before he comedically interrupts them okay write that down it was anywhere between 9 and 12 seconds which doesn't sound like much but it's it it works
01:02:15
comedically all right then I said how far back in time does he reference a current event to put in a joke that he
01:02:23
might give because you can't go too far back cuz no one remembers it the joke has to work without you reminding people
01:02:29
what they're supposed to know so very intensely the the previous day little less the second day by the time the third day in the past there's hardly any reference to it okay so I studied the
01:02:43
last two or three days of current events I practiced my sound bites even more to
01:02:49
fit them into this time frame and I get on the show and I deliver the lines that
01:02:54
mean the sound bites oh but I come preloaded with anything he could possibly ask me so I'm like I'm
01:03:03
I'm I I waddle into the studio with a utility belts worth of thoughts and ideas that he could be asking me okay so I'm there and if you see me on
01:03:14
these shows I'm a little manic because the it's coursing through me all this knowledge and information that I need a
01:03:20
response to just in case he asks me so we do this and I get the point of and he makes the comedic point and now my thought is not dangling in the middle of a joke because I completed the thought
01:03:32
the joke tightens that up and then we move on right so we go through this whole interview and he mentions the
01:03:38
current event and I have a little sound B thing about that after the interview people come up to me you know what they
01:03:43
said they said Neil you're such a natural and you have such good chemistry with John Stewart my they have no
01:03:56
idea how much time I invested to look natural pardon my expl of there but we swear all the time
01:04:07
yeah what I'm saying is I wanted to be as good as I possibly could have been in that interview knowing his audience because each host has their own audience you
01:04:19
want to serve Their audience I don't want to just give the stump speech so everything that I imagined for myself
01:04:25
was for for him and his audience I would communicate differently on a different talk daytime talk shows are different
01:04:31
than the evening comedic news uh on a documentary it's different so my only point of this with these examples are I pay attention to whether people
01:04:44
are paying attention to me if I'm giving you an explanation and you're drifting all that's not working let me pull that out of the utility belt let me try something else uh if I talk about black
01:04:56
holes in a particular way oh you're leaning in in the conversation and your eyebrows are r that that
01:05:02
worked so I have a database of people's Expressions while I'm talking to them and I sift that yeah so that I pick
01:05:15
and choose what is most impactful in the few minutes we have together otherwise I'm dragging you through a syllabus that who the hell cares what if the devices that you you probably don't do even do
01:05:28
it intent you're saying it's natural I didn't say I can edit out you know don't edit that out don't edit that out okay okay so what are the what are the devices that you intentionally work
01:05:40
very very hard on to imploy that that I might take from you and become a as good a speaker as you are as engaging and as
01:05:47
like captivating despite the fact that you're delivering such complex subject matter at times but it still seems
01:05:53
accessible to someone like me that is just just simply a a chimp not everything that excites me as a professional in the field will excite
01:06:04
you you need to know you need to sort them into those categories and maybe there's something that will excite me and you'll see me get all excited and you'll get giddy
01:06:15
because you like watching me get excited that's a different dynamic in that moment M all right it is kind of fun I
01:06:21
like watching uh you know I have a colleague who's like all into leeches right he specializes in invertebrates and leeches among them just to hear him talk about I I don't care about leeches
01:06:33
but he does it's like wow I didn't know anyone could care that much about a blood sucking invertebrate but it was
01:06:40
just I'm delighted to watch that all right but so you sort things that excite you from things that could excite someone else well how do you know you have to practice that okay uh strike up
01:06:53
conversations watch if people care about what you say is there some other conversation that distracts them from your conversation with them well go
01:07:04
back to the drawing board on that one okay and I also be a good listener watch what excites other people when they're in conversations with other people and that's what I've done so in that way I'm
01:07:19
I'm fully socialized my parents were social creatures and we held dinner parties often uh hosting conversations and I'd watch that uh I'm I'm a kid so
01:07:31
I'm not for their dinner parties I didn't have a seat at the table but um the idea of being able to communicate and my father's a sociologist that's all he ever did uh that I think mattered
01:07:44
within me and you have to be able to read people's facial you know what we did with my kids uh it was first evidence that they were not autistic but also I think it's
01:07:55
good practice get a when they're old enough to start thinking about human emotion maybe 8 n early the TW years
01:08:07
between 8 and 12 where they can actively think about what someone else thinks and feels
01:08:14
okay is the person angry is the person happy is they sad are they jealous or they whatever okay so what I did was or
01:08:22
what you can do is find a romantic comedy that is well acted all right where where you have stars that really do it right and sit
01:08:36
down and watch the movie with the sound off and have your kids ask them what do you think they're thinking now what do you think
01:08:51
she's feeling what do you think she's saying what do you think she's going to do next and you just watch it and the
01:08:56
actors are not only delivering lines they're feeling their roles and you might have
01:09:03
to wait if your kid is a little slower that way maybe they have to be 13 or 14 Middle School where your social standing
01:09:10
begins matters more than in elementary school you're not even you don't even care right so maybe it's a middle school
01:09:15
thing more than an elementary school thing and that way you can say you thought she said well let's check and
01:09:21
you go back and it turns out yes she was jealous in that moment and so it trains
01:09:26
you to read a facial expression and a good actor will do this that's what makes them good actors and and you don't
01:09:32
rely on the sound just the visual and it's an exercise in Reading faces reading people reading emotions and so you want to do this and
01:09:44
in the limit you become become in full up empath right I think that's a noun yeah uh an
01:09:50
empath uh that has shaped some people's careers this is real we're human we're social creatures so yeah I fold that in because I want to reach
01:10:02
you oh and what things do you care about in my podcast it's called star talk I have a co-host who's a comedian a professional stand-up
01:10:15
comedian and the anatomy of the podcast is there's sort of the Trinity there's the science content there's the humor and is pop
01:10:27
culture why do I care about pop culture because you walk into the room already framed in a scaffold of Pop Culture if I know that in advance I
01:10:39
don't have to start from scratch when I'm teaching you something I'm going to say oh I have a bit of science that I
01:10:45
can clad onto this part of your scaffold your pop culture scaffold and you know something it fits it sticks and you say whoa I never knew that about
01:10:57
this there's an American football game that ended in a tie and but we don't end in ties right so there's an overtime and you reach a point where it's sudden death overtime sudden death
01:11:11
where the next person that scores wins the game so this person was was ready to kick for a it's called a field goal and
01:11:19
it's 50 yards out 50 yards oh my gosh okay that's hard so they kick it and no one breathes for the 3 or 4 seconds the ball is so the ball tumbles in the air
01:11:33
and there it goes and everybody just follows it and look it up and the ball hit the left
01:11:40
upright and kened in for the win and I said whoa wait a minute what's the orientation of this Stadium it's north south this is a round ball hitting a
01:11:54
round post and going in do you realize round things hitting other round things fractions of an inch make a difference so I did a fast calculation
01:12:08
and then I tweeted the Cincinnati Bengals for the for the sudden death field goal was that kened off the upright was
01:12:24
aided by a 1 cm shift to the right given to it by the rotation of the earth people lost their minds okay
01:12:39
people okay the the Cincinnati Bengals where the local newspaper said God help them win the game and so everybody so I didn't have to say what football is who the
01:12:51
Cincinnati Bengals are what a sudden death goal is what a field goal is is or explain that the goalposts have a left
01:12:57
and a right goalpost I didn't have to introduce any of that that's an example of the pop culture that someone walks into the room with and I found a bit of
01:13:08
science that I know they're going to care about because it touches something that's pop culture that they already
01:13:14
care about and I would follow that up with it's a coriolis force and it's why storms rotate clockwise counterclockwise
01:13:21
in the northern hem I'd followed up with the lesson plan but I got your interest yeah okay yeah I didn't start out that
01:13:28
way there's such a thing as a Corola for no no go where they care go where they care that's and that's what I do professionally if I spoke to Alice and I
01:13:39
said your wife and I said Alice what does Neil struggle with what would she say to me struggle with oh um personally
01:13:49
well I I don't know entirely um but I know I like to eat more than I like to exercise and I used to be very high high
01:14:01
highly tuned athlete so I remember what it was like to be in complete shape I I remember I also used to dance so I could
01:14:08
could do a full split I was doing you know I could I was like totally in shape so I have that memory which in a way is
01:14:15
worse than never having been in shape so she'll say I wouldn't call it struggling but I would say she would say that
01:14:23
um I need to car more time to exercise just to stay healthy I think is so that that's one of them uh another thing we we talk a lot we've been married 34
01:14:35
years and you say what's the secret you know anytime someone asks you what the secret is they're being lazy because it assumes just know this
01:14:49
one thing and everything will be better how much of life actually works that way when someone said what's your secret to knowing astrophysic it's like you know
01:15:01
working at it 60 hours a week that's the secret somebody asks a chef what's your
01:15:08
secret in this recipe it's because I went to Chef school for six years that's the secret so I've never asked someone
01:15:15
what's your secret because I that's disrespect for the actual work that could go into what it is to gain the
01:15:22
expertise or the state of existence that someone has achieved um I think in a marriage it's
01:15:30
uh you know most or half end in divorce within some number of years so uh what's
01:15:36
what's going on with the institution and I think we're not trained how to communicate you're living with a person every day of your life it's really easy to take that person for granted it's
01:15:52
really easy to to uh to enter states of boredom because you've already talked about so what you do you do new things with each other as
01:16:05
often as you can you go on a trip explore new hobbies you go you know you take up a a new sport you play tennis or whatever just do something new as you
01:16:18
would with any other new person right why does the other new person look really good because they're new
01:16:25
okay so you could you can always be new in your marriage if you do new things why not travel travel together then every day is a new experience you both share so when you get back home you have
01:16:38
something new to talk about new to share new to places to grow and this thing where I want to go on a dating app where I can find someone who's just like me I don't want anyone just like me I
01:16:53
already have me I want someone different I want someone I can learn from someone with different interests that I could
01:16:59
grow into so nothing that I've ever used a dating app but if I had a dating app uh
01:17:07
that's I would look for someone who is just really different and it's odd because so many of the apps are finding
01:17:14
someone just like you all right there's now like a Christian app and a Jewish app and a this app and a and a find someone who has this category it's like wow
01:17:25
w why not just have some fun with somebody who's just different one of the themes we talk about a lot in this podcast is mental health and the the conversation around mental health is is really developed over the last 10 years
01:17:37
from a time when we didn't completely oh my gosh yeah it's a it's the the perception of it has completely changed in terms of being destigmatized but then our awareness and our understanding of
01:17:49
concept of physical health and mental health is now more present than ever was there an event that put your mental health in focus for your for you like
01:17:55
really made you cognizant of the fact that you have mental health and it's something that you have
01:18:00
to I was going to say Protect but just yeah keep healthy I guess it often you know okay I don't have a simple I have an answer but it's not simple how much time you got left here couple
01:18:15
minutes um there's a friend I told you it's a long story but you asked it there was someone my age maybe one year older when I was in high school who died who
01:18:28
was the son of a very close family friend of my parents we might have played together as
01:18:34
very small children but I didn't know him as a teenager okay he died of brain cancer get very
01:18:42
tragic you're 17 years old and you die of brain cancer ready to go off to college and all the rest they bust
01:18:49
in school kids from the school okay and they unloaded and they filled this chapel and there's a closed casket
01:19:01
because it was it was brain cancer so you know and there's a picture of them on the
01:19:07
casket and I'm watching this and the you know the his classmates are like holding each other as they walk up
01:19:20
the aisle and there's the organ plane no it's not a New Orleans song where you sort of celebrate the life of the person
01:19:32
who just died it was the kind of organ music where you want to be sad that the person died and I'm watching this then I start getting emotional and like a tear shows
01:19:46
up in my eye and I said wait a minute I don't know this kid I don't even remember him I'd be crying because the organ is making me cry I'd
01:19:58
be crying because I'm seeing other people who did know him cry and I did a fast calculation how many people are dying in this hour in the city or in the
01:20:11
country or in the world am I crying for them who I equally don't know I rationalized an emotional state out of
01:20:24
the this this pain and misery and I said if I'm not tearing for everybody else who dies who I don't know I should not be tearing for this person and so I
01:20:37
sucked the tears back up and just observed it anthropologically that there's a funeral going on right in
01:20:43
front of me that was an expression of control over my emotions that is basically
01:20:55
how I lived for the first 19 years of my life what was the cost the cost no cost why would there be a cost why should there be a cost to not
01:21:09
having forced emotions by other to to to no there's what cost I'm I'm a geek kid okay and emotions are something that
01:21:21
interfere with rational thought but this changed so what I can say to you is you're emotional what's the cost
01:21:28
for not being rational okay I could totally put the question back on you what's the C you slammed the door you hung up the phone back when we had phones to hung up you slammed it down
01:21:40
you cried when you didn't even know the person okay that's your cost so we we maybe we're simply different people I'm not saying they shouldn't have cried they knew them of
01:21:51
course they're going to cry I didn't organist stop making me cry and so I didn't okay so how did that
01:22:07
change my freshman year college it all changed it all changed first semester I take a class in Art and
01:22:20
Design they play music and they say draw the music and it's like I don't know what you're talking about what do you feel the music and
01:22:32
draw how it makes you feel I say it's just music I'm listening to I'm like a it's like two ships passing in the night I don't know what the hell this person is talking about I don't know what he
01:22:43
means I don't know you know should I still stay in this class what is it a waste of time what's going on here and
01:22:52
he says here's what you do draw the energy in the music and excuse me I like I'm a
01:23:00
physicist right energy is equals mc squared there's kinetic energy there's mechanical energy there's chemical
01:23:06
energy energy is not what you draw out of music okay okay so I said all right I don't know what he's saying but I'll try something
01:23:19
and then he criticizes it okay so I don't know what the hell I'm doing why am I in this should I drop the class
01:23:26
okay then they roll in the pumpkins they they draw the pumpkins okay now I can I can do this it's it's it's a task
01:23:33
there's a pumpkin in front of me I'm going to draw it so I draw pumpkins and takes me a few tries to get
01:23:39
the hang of it but I'm I'm one of the world's best pumpkin drawers to this day because of that we spent weeks drawing
01:23:46
pumpkins and they're also are leaning on each other and they have these sort of seams in them and the not all of them
01:23:53
have the same size handle the neck that comes out and there some have bruises and there's like 30 of them up in the front of so I'm drawing them I said okay uh is this is this all
01:24:06
we're going to do with this okay after pumpkins became the entire meaning of my life for two or three weeks we returned to the studio the
01:24:17
pumpkins are still there and then they said now draw dra the space between the pumpkins and I just
01:24:34
snapped it was like wait a minute you're telling me that I give object and meaning objective meaning to these things that we call pumpkins and
01:24:48
now these pumpkins are just the boundaries to something else that I'm giving meaning to and that's the space between the pumpkins and it was like
01:25:01
[Music] whoa so I started drawing the space between the pumpkins and the pumpkins were now the edges of things not the object of what
01:25:14
I'm drawing and my brain turned inside out and I started looking looking around I say are these lights or is it a shadow
01:25:28
that makes the shape am I in a space is the space what's real or is it the boundary of the space if the boundary weren't there would I still be in this space I still be breathing this
01:25:43
air but we wouldn't call it a space because that boundary isn't there so the B so my I everything looked different
01:25:50
after then everything and from that moment onward I could talk to artists with abstract
01:26:03
vocabulary how does this painting feel what does it do for you what do what are your what are your emotions it's it it it opened up a
01:26:15
box an emotional state that was previously non-communicative with the rest of my
01:26:22
mind it was kept there I could act it's not that I didn't know how to cry it's just that the crying had nothing to do
01:26:28
with anything else that was objectively real so what they did it it it found the
01:26:34
place where it pride it open and there was spillage there was cross spillage so I can tell you this now there's no way this sentence could have come out of my head on my iPhone I have
01:26:48
skin it's not a casing it's just it's called a skin and it is a section of Van Go's star night the actual name of the painting is the star night okay and it's
01:27:00
got these swirly beautiful colors and all right it's my favorite painting why because it's certainly not what he
01:27:14
saw the sky has never looked this way but it's definitely what he felt and for me an artist's task their Duty
01:27:30
in this world not to prescribe about this but for me their duty is to show me the world as I do not see it take me someplace give me a
01:27:42
perspective that will broaden my interpretation of reality that is a thought an idea a sentence that could have never come out of my mouth until that moment where I
01:27:55
drew the space between the pumpkins and that access to abstract thinking to now in the early days I'd watch a Broadway musical and two people
01:28:07
walk up to each other speaking uhoh a song is about to happen and then they sing about their love for each other I
01:28:13
say why don't you just cut the song just say you love each other move on to the next scene that's how I felt as a
01:28:20
child after college after that course I see the two people walk up to each other and they're speaking their emotions and I'm saying you
01:28:31
know when you sing your emotions it reaches a deeper part not only within yourself but within the listeners because there's more of your emotion
01:28:44
expressed when you sing and so now I long for the song in a Broadway musical the Simplicity of expressed
01:28:58
emotion so I don't want to quite say I'm the opposite of what I was when I suck back the tears in that
01:29:05
funeral but I'm going to say that dare I suggest a welldeveloped access to both your emotions and your rational self with some control over the
01:29:21
two you don't want rampant contamination but just be able to close the door every now and then between the two and then
01:29:27
open it uh I think can serve us greatly as a civilization if I were to offer perspective and advice there are times where you need your rational self
01:29:40
otherwise you will not make a decision that's in the best interest of your health your wealth or your
01:29:46
security but don't let that hide what emotions you might have because the world's greatest art as as far as I can tell issues forth from rampant emotion
01:29:58
that we're capable of as human beings Neil thank you we have um a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest asks a question for the next guest without knowing who they're
01:30:09
going to ask it for and they write it in this book and I don't get to see it till I open it which is fun for me but you
01:30:14
get to see it now I get to see it now okay Jack Jack always looks but I never look when was the last time you cried
01:30:21
and why uh I cry often now that the door to my emotions has been found and pride open so I cry often I cry at
01:30:39
very simple things I cry at at simple emotional moments in in in a play uh resident of New York city so we consume as many londoners surely consume the
01:30:55
theater scene um I'll cry even in a moment in a musical when musical is supposed to make you happy but there
01:31:01
might be a tender moment I tear up if I see acts of of um sensitivity and kindness in a situation where you would not expect it okay if you see a War torn scene and
01:31:25
a soldier picks up a doll and hands it to a child there's a a soldier who's brandishing a weapon for killing people and they take a moment to do that
01:31:43
I'll tear up I'm tearing up now just thinking of such a scene when that happens so I tear up in unexpected acts of
01:31:59
kindness cuz it's hope for the world I'll tear up in a movie uh usually in a theater because it's a big immersive experience less so at home on a TV even the same movie I might feel it
01:32:14
a little more in a theater immersiveness matters because it's it's coming at you
01:32:19
for more in more ways with with greater strength the sound is greater the visual
01:32:26
effects are greater uh you're there as a participant in the film so um so I I probably will tear up once or twice a week uh for those reasons and more but
01:32:40
those are the more common sort of reasons that [Music] arise Neil thank you thank you for the
01:32:46
inspiration over the last decade thank you for um being the Star Messenger in my life which is the name of your new
01:32:51
book because you uh it's funny I was I was was thinking about it as as we started this conversation that that was actually the moment that I became
01:32:57
obsessed with the universe when I first watched you present Cosmos all those years ago um and this book is just a
01:33:03
continuation of that but it's a very current book in the sense that it speaks to some of the profound issues that are
01:33:09
happening in the world the inside cover I think presents a really great explanation of that in a time when our
01:33:14
political and cultural views feel more polarized than ever Tyson provides a much needed antidote to so much of what
01:33:20
divides us while making a passionate case for the twin char of Enlightenment a cosmic
01:33:26
perspective and the rationality of Science and that's exactly what this book is it's a necessary antidote to the
01:33:32
modern times we're living in well thank you for your support of that I will say that Star Messenger comes from Galileo
01:33:39
where he first perfects the telescope after only just having heard that the telescope was invented in the
01:33:46
Netherlands he said oh my gosh that's do let me make my own version of it he makes the best version that exists in
01:33:51
the world observes the night SK notices that Venus goes through phases which can only happen if Venus is going
01:33:58
around the Sun and not around Earth uh it could he notices that the sun has spots the moon has craters the Jupiter
01:34:05
has moons that orbit it he didn't call them moons they were called Jupiter stars because why would you think they were moons who knows and he reports this
01:34:13
with the first evidence that Earth is not the center of all motion and he called it siderius nunus Starry Messenger Meer the Star Messenger wasn't him the Star Messenger
01:34:27
was these Messengers themselves from the sky that are conflicting with prevailing
01:34:33
belief systems about humans and about Earth and he got into big trouble with the church so what I as an astrophysicist I found all the starry messages I could
01:34:45
and applied them to our plight here on Earth and that's the summary of what's going on in that book death is a topic you mention in this book yes life and
01:34:57
death life and I'm more compelled by death as should we all be yeah I I was a Christian growing up until the age of about 18 and then when I discovered atheism or agnosticism or
01:35:09
whatever they want to call it my perspective of death changed I actually became really comfortable with death the prospect of death where do you think and
01:35:17
where are you at in your perspective and thoughts on death for myself or just in general in
01:35:23
general and s probably quite Inseparable I imagine I don't know death uh it it death comes up as a as a topic of
01:35:33
conversation commonly when we talk about prolonging life and now that we're into the genome and into human physiology might there be
01:35:45
a day where you can live forever okay and there's something called The Generation that will have
01:35:52
escape velocity do you know what that is is okay I'll tell you what it is so in the last 50 years we've increased life expectancy 20
01:36:04
years in the last 10 years we've increased life expectancy by five years so there will be a time where in the last year we increased like
01:36:17
expectancy by a year at that moment Homo sapiens have achieved escape velocity from
01:36:24
Death okay that generation will never die unless you're hit by a bus okay so that brings to you the question if you could live
01:36:36
forever would you and my reply to that and I don't want to answer for other people so this is my I want to be very clear that yes I
01:36:50
have my opinions but I don't care if you share my opinions you should have your own opinions okay my Outlook on this
01:37:01
is let's take for example a bouquet of flowers if you buy a bouquet of flowers and hand them to your loved one and the bouquet the flowers are made of plastic how would your loved one reply
01:37:15
to that they they probably think you don't love them but you say but darling they'll last forever okay no that's not the variable here
01:37:29
that's not what matters the fact that flowers die is the very reason why they have meaning as a
01:37:42
gift your handed flowers They're going to be dead in seven days that means you know you better pay attention to them
01:37:48
you're going to smell them you're going to take care of them you're going to make sure you change the water and trim the stems and you're going to put it in
01:37:54
a central place so that not only you see them but so does everybody else you're going to celebrate those
01:38:01
flowers while they are alive because the day is going to come very quickly where they're going to die and in their sence you're going to nurse
01:38:13
them through as the neck gets a little weak on the stem you might try to prop them
01:38:20
up until they're gone it is the fact that they're going to die that gives them meaning as a
01:38:31
gift and dare I say that my knowledge that I'm gonna die gives not only meaning to my being
01:38:44
alive it gives urgency to it on my deathbed I do not want to regret having the interest and ability to have solved the problem that I did not
01:39:01
solve to have an experience that I could have had but then I did not knowing I'm going to die means I'm going to wake up in the
01:39:13
morning and I'm going to be all about action action I it's I tell people I love them if I love them I will accomplish thing I
01:39:26
will learn this thing I wanted to learn I will do all I can because you know what I want on my
01:39:34
Tombstone it's a quote from a famous American educator of two centuries ago his name is Harris man who's also a university president I think it was he gave a commencement
01:39:46
speech one of his last and he says to the graduates I beseech you love that word nobody uses
01:39:53
that word anymore beseech Shakespeare loved it I beseech you to treasure up in your hearts these my parting
01:40:05
words be ashamed to die until you have scored some victory for Humanity I want that on my Tombstone I don't want any other Monument but that
01:40:21
on my tombstone if everyone lived to that goal how different the world would be how enriched it would be with people's
01:40:33
energy to improve the lot not only of others as individuals but of your neighborhood your Society civilization
01:40:45
itself so that's what I think of when I think of death by the way in there I referen
01:40:59
dogs there's a dog over there for anyone there's a dog over there called Leica in the corner of this room Leica where have
01:41:05
I heard that name Leica 65 years ago Leica orbits Earth the first dog to orbit Earth uh the first animal to orbit Earth then
01:41:20
there's some guinea pigs and then there were some um chimps and then Yuri Gagarin orbits the
01:41:28
earth the first human I think he was this seventh mammal to orbit the earth I had to check my notes on this but it was uh if you add up mammals we humans were very late in the in the space
01:41:41
achievement scale so when you come home for having been away if you own a dog you will know exactly what I'm describing by the way this does not happen with cats so with
01:41:57
the dog the dog is happy to see you not just happy hey glad you're home it's they jump up and down and they want to lick your face and they want to jump into your lap if it's a lap dog and if
01:42:09
it's a if it's an Irish wolf hound they'll want to knock you over and lick you in the face they're
01:42:16
excited by you first I would ask did you do anything that day that deserved that
01:42:22
praise so one famous quote is be the person the your dog thinks you are okay that's a high bar let me say but there's the and by the way if
01:42:35
you go out to just check the mail and come back the dog is happy to see you so now wait a minute well why uh let me just make up a reason okay
01:42:49
I'm just pulling this out of my ass you ready okay uh dogs don't live as long as we do the famous dog year calculation
01:43:03
there's some nuances to it but the blunt calculation is one dog year is seven human years okay so when a dog is 10 they're like
01:43:14
70 all right when a dog is 12 they're 84 they're getting ready to die okay dogs die between age basically 12 and 16 okay
01:43:26
all right wait a minute if it's a factor of seven difference it means we live an entire week of Our
01:43:42
Lives for every single day a dog lives so maybe the dog knows it won't live as long as we will
01:43:55
maybe it knows it's got a truncated life expectancy relative to humans maybe it knows it's got to make everyday
01:44:08
count we could languish away five days out of the week you still have the other two days to watch football with your
01:44:16
friends the dog doesn't have that luxury so I'm making this up I'm going to declare that dogs know that every day of their lives matter and therefore
01:44:27
they're going to make it count and they're going to be happy every day you ever wake up to a dog that's depressed
01:44:35
never uh no you know I'll walk myself today don't worry about it I'll feed I don't want to e no they've been sick all right that's
01:44:46
how you know they're sick they're not licking you in the face that's a sad day for the dog but then they pop back dogs
01:44:54
don't stay sick for long because they live seven times faster than we do have you ever taken a dog to the vet and they perform surgery on the
01:45:06
dog okay you know where I'm going here they perform surgery the next day the dog is
01:45:13
out running around in the park I've seen dog with the leg amputated amputated leg and the next day they're a little slower but they're kind
01:45:23
of walking around and they still want to lick you in the face and there's good as new after 3 days if we had one of our
01:45:29
legs amputated oh my gosh I'm still in the hospital a month later dogs live in the fast lane and maybe they know
01:45:41
it and so I want to think to myself no I'm not licking people in the face but I want to experience the joy and the urgency that dogs do simply by
01:45:53
being alive Neil thank you thank you for the generosity of your time thank you for
01:45:59
all the inspiration thank you for uh schooling me in the most um uh unintentional way on how to be a wonderful engaging communicator and how to make very complex subject matter fun
01:46:10
and accessible for every bit well thank you and can I end with the beginning quote of the book please may I at the
01:46:17
beginning of the book I wanted to set the mood because Earth from space is very different than Earth Earth from Earth's
01:46:26
surface oh dedicated to the memory of siril degrass Tyson and all others who want to see the world as it could be rather than as it
01:46:40
is that was my father okay so here's the quote Apollo astronaut Edgar Mitchell Apollo 14 he went to the moon and saw Earth cuz kind
01:46:53
of what happened we went to the moon to discover the moon to explore the moon and we look back over our shoulders and
01:46:58
we kind of discovered Earth for the first time the birth of the modern conservation and environmental
01:47:06
movement began while we were walking on the moon because there was Earth a drift
01:47:13
alone in the darkness of space with no hint that help would come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves it's a that very line is in uh Carl Sean
01:47:26
penned in his book a pale blue dot so here's Edgar Mitchell you develop an instant Global
01:47:33
Consciousness a people orientation an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world and a compulsion to do something about it from out there on the
01:47:44
moon International politics looks so petty you want to grab a politician by the Scruff of the neck and drag him a
01:47:51
quar million miles out and say look at that you son of a [Music] we're done quick word from one of our sponsors I've got a tip for all of you that will make your virtual meeting experiences I
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[Music] ah [Music]