June 8, 2025 • 61 mins
Today on STBYM, we’re bringing you an episode on the Cosmos from a new podcast: Smart Girl Dumb Questions. In each episode, host Nayeema Raza asks simple questions to big thinkers. This one is with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Nayeema asks him: what happened before the Big Bang? Would wormholes save us from ever going to the airport again? Do aliens exist? And, oh yes, are horoscopes real?
If you like this episode of Smart Girl Dumb Questions, you can find more SGDQ with Mark Cuban on capitalism, Kenji Lopez on food science and 11 Year Olds on what kids do all day here.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everybody, I'm Joe McCormick of Stuff to blow your mind. Today,
we want to play you an episode of a new
show called Smart Girl Dumb Questions, hosted by journalist Naima Raza.
Each Friday, she unpacks complex ideas by asking simple questions
to big thinkers. This one is with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
They talk about.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Dimensions, wormholes, time travel, and brick and Morty. So enjoy
the episode and you can find more episodes of Smart
Girl Dumb Questions wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
There was an asteroid set to meet the Earth in
the year twenty thirty two.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Well, that's to put very politely, to meet the Earth, Jemmy,
they collide. Yes, we can say meet and greet the Earth.
The press ran with the fact that the likelihood of
it hitting Earth went up briefly from like one percent
to three percent.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
That was it, eh, But one percent is not that
different from three percent, so you're saying it still might
happen a.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Third And then it went Yeah, I feel.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Like it's a very binary situation, this meeting of Earth
and the asteris.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Well, the value of that news cycle, yes, is people
were trained to follow the scientific progress on the number.
That's an important way that the public should be interacting
with the moving frontier of science. I'm happy that we
went through that episode because that will happen more frequently
(01:33):
going forward. We have better data, better telescopes to see
asteroids of that size in that way.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Yeah, Previously we wouldn't have even known the difference between
the zero and the one percent, even.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Known it was there. That we might have known it
was there, But when it was much closer.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Like Bruce Willis Ben Affleck close, well, you.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Don't get me started on arm again. That movie violated
more laws of physics per minute than any other psych
fiction movie ever. Plus an asteroid the size of Texas
we would have discovered two hundred years ago. That's the
good thing about asteroids that might kill us, right if
I met, They are the largest and the easiest to detect.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Smart girl dumb questions. Hi, welcome to smart girl dumb Questions.
I'm named Areza. You're a smart girl with the dumb questions,
and that telling me the good thing about the asteroids
that might kill us, that they're larger and easier to detect.
Is Neil deGrasse Tyson. He's an astrophysicist, a science communicator,
(02:38):
an educator, the director of Hayden Planetarium here in New York,
and someone whose job it is to help make sense
of the universe really for people like me who just
don't get it all the time. Neil has written several
best selling books, including Astrophysics for People in a Hurry
and Merlin's Tour of the Universe. And I was so
excited to talk to Neil because of all the things
(02:58):
that I'm dumb about, science really top the list. Like
I took biology in school, but I couldn't look when
the frog got dissected. And I took chemistry, but all
I remember is kind of honk, like hydrogen bonds once
and oxygen bonds twice and nitrogen bonds three times, and
oh my god, I cannot believe I am even telling
you this on a podcast. So my dumb question for
Neil Degrass Tyson was are we living in a simulation?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Like?
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Is this whole universe a simulation? But before we got there,
I had to understand what the universe was. And we
started small, like Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star small, and we
worked our way up into galaxies and universes and multiverses
and aliens, and this idea of wormholes which maybe allow
you to cross through space time that blew my mind.
Here's my conversation with Neil de grass Tyson. So I
(03:45):
want to start with the building blocks the stars.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
I'm your servant in this interview.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
You're not anyone servant.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yeah, I'm a servant of your curiosity. And by the way,
it's not for you to judge whether you're asking a
dumb question.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
Okay, oh, you want to challenge the whole premise of
my show.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
It's whether I give a dumb answer.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
The dumbness is in the eye of the answer.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Yes, because an educator should be sensitive to how a
person's tangled mental pathways might be interpreting the world. And
then that one gurgles up as a question. Then I
deeply care about how you thought about the world, and
(04:31):
that puts the onus on me to figure out a
way to respond such that what I share with you
is received by your learning receptors.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Are you untangling me or are you just sending it
down the tangled pipe?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
Navigating a tangled path? Sometimes I'm a badly tangled from life. Yeah, right,
And so you got to navigate that.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
At the end of this, I would like an assessment
of how tangled I am compared to the most tangled
person you're.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
In fact, when I post on social media and I
see the comment thread, I take that as a neurosynaptic
snapshot of how people think about words. I've used, phrases,
I've offered, content I've delivered. If I think I posted tweet,
let's say, and if I think it's funny and no
one laughs, it's not funny.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
It's not funny. It's like your own personal fMRI all
of America or all of the world.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Very good, Yeah, that's my it's a it's a social
media fMRI.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
Okay, Twinkle Twinkle, little Star. I was at a roller
skating rink the other.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Day, Neil, and that's a thing.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
That's a thing, Okay, a roller skating disco. I was
told by somebody there that when you see a star,
you look at the star. That star is so far away,
both in distance and time, that the light I am
seeing from that star means that the star may not
even be there anymore? Is that corrector? And oh, I
can tell by your eyes that this person.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
So you learned this at a disco roller skating rink. Yes,
we're all that's where you are. The great wisdom of
the world is dispersed. It's completely correct, but misleading, all right. So,
because it takes light time to travel between any two points. Yeah,
the world you see is not as it is, but
(06:18):
as it once was when the light from that object
left En Routier retina. I see you right now, not
as you are, but as you were four billions of
a second ago. Now I'm not going to then say
I wonder if she's still alive, because four billions of
a second is small compared with your life expectancy. So
(06:40):
too it is with stars. There's stars that are thousands
of light years away. Yes, it could have died, but
stars live billions and in some cases trillions of years. Ah,
So a thousand year delay that you're not going to
catch it in the last thousand years of its life. Now,
of course some stars do explode, but at a rate
(07:04):
of maybe two per century per galaxy.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
How long does it take us to know with the
telescopes and whatnot.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
The information about the death of the star is on
route through space. So let's take the sun. Right, If
someone plucks the sun out of the middle of the
Solar System. You wouldn't know for eight minutes and twenty seconds,
because that's how far correct still feel the gravity. We'd
still orbit even though there's nothing there, right, we'd still
do well, you wouldn't know there's nothing there. So eight
minutes and twenty seconds go by, and then we plunge
(07:35):
into darkness. The temperature of the Earth descends, and we
fly off at a tangent lost in interstellar space.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
That's the first page of your book. This is like
what happens if the Earth were to stop rotating. And
your answer is to pin yourself down unless you want
to go at what is it, eight hundred miles per hour?
I mean, my mind is broken by your book.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
That's a good thing. And then you reassemble it into
the laws of physics that guide.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
The universe at the rollers category apparently back to the
building walks.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
Okay, to start at the beginning of the universe.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Now, I don't want to start the universe because the
universe is expanding. So if we start at the beginning,
by the time we finish, it will be even bigger
than we could get to. Okay, you can look into telescopes,
you can see what's happening out there. We cannot see
the Big Bang.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
That's correct, but for reasons that are not obvious.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
But yeah, yeah, we see the afterglow, correct. So what
are the reasons that are not obvious?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Is a barrier? The light can't pass through that afterglow?
It's opaque to light.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
And there's no technology that we're developing to try to see.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
It's not using light. Before the universe had this opaque barrier,
it was active in ways that we have some telescopes
that can see through the barrier to those early times,
and so one of them is gravitational waves.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Do we know what happened before the Big Bang?
Speaker 2 (08:53):
No, but we have ideas.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
Do we know that something for sure happened before the
Big Bang? Is it possible at the Big Bang?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Oh, for sure, But we have ideas.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
What are the ideas?
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Our universe is a natural expression of a larger entity
called a multiverse that's making universes forever, and there could
be an infinite number of multiverses. All that does is
move the question earlier right way? Do we get the
multiverse from? Right?
Speaker 3 (09:21):
Where did that start?
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Right? So this is this is a big challenge with
origins questions because the origin of something typically, if it's singular,
you can't compare it to the origin of something else. However,
let's look back in time the origin of the Earth. Peoples, Oh,
we'll never know the origin of the Earth because you
can't go back in time. This was logged, lobbed against
(09:44):
astronomers centuries ago. Until we have telescopes that look at
other star systems being born and you can see them
making planets. So now I have comparisons, and I said, oh,
that must be how our planet got made. These are
planets around a star that looks just like ours. And
when it's not singular, you can do you can compare
and contrast. We found galaxies being born, so now our
galaxy is not the whole thing. We only have one universe.
(10:06):
We don't know how it was foreigned, but maybe there
are other universes that we can compare it to.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
Do you have a hunch or is that not a thing?
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Going with the multiverse. It feels right and it looks
good coming out of the equations. We're not just pulling
it out of our ass. The equations give us the multiverse.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Okay, yeah, And all of this is rooted in math.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Yeah, that is well, well, it's served by math, I
should say, it's rooted in what the universe really is,
whatever that is, and we invent math. And it's one
of the great miracles of science that this invention we
call math has anything at all to do with the
with the universe that we didn't invent.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
It's like our language for trying to understand the universe's
math is.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
That is the language of the universe, the way Spanish
is the language of Spain.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Well, this is great because I interviewed two eleven year
olds recently and they said they feel everything they learn
is not useful.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
The problem is, when we're in school, the expectation is
that what you learn is what will be useful to
you later. That implies that the only way we function
is by applying discrete knowledge to discrete problems. But no,
most of the ways you function is you're applying wisdom
and insight to a problem you've never seen before. And
(11:20):
where does that wisdom and insight come from the collection
of all of the things you learned, Yes, but also
all the ways you learned. You are a turn paper
on Julius Caesar. Well, you had to research that these
are methods, tools and tactics didn't even matter. There was
that about Julius Caesar that you had to go through
that exercise to arrive at that term paper, and that
(11:41):
is the exercise that you carry forth. Math and physics
are the embodiment of a new kind of brain wiring
that teaches you not just what to know about the universe,
but how to think, how to think about knowing it
even correct.
Speaker 3 (11:56):
Yeah, and that's good news. I didn't tell them that
the process by which they were learning it's going to
be invaluable. But I didn't get to wisdom and insight.
But I like that distinction.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
There's knowledge, wisdom, and insight. Yeah, and they're they're more
refined versions of themselves. And also you can learn this
and learn that and learn this, and then later on
in life see a connection that no one else did.
One could define genius in just that way. The genius
is a person who sees what everyone else sees and
(12:24):
thinks what no one else has thought.
Speaker 3 (12:26):
Do you think you're a genius?
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Other than in that phrase definition, I never used the word.
It's a label, and when you start labeling people, it's
shorthand for I don't need to know anything more about you.
Because I've given you this label. I know everything I
need to know about you, so I don't even have
to have a conversation. So I'm just anti label.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
So Big Bang happens before the Big Bang. It's possible.
We don't know exactly what happened, but it's possible that
there are these multiverses a multiverse sorry, crinking.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Out our universes such as ours.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
Yes, and so there could be infinite universe. Y do
we exist in other universes?
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Well, it depends on what you mean by that. They
would likely if this model is accurate. Yeah, then there
are enough universes so that there's an entire universe where
all events are playing out exactly as they are in
this universe. Or you know, we're having this conversation except
on the interviewer and you're the subject. But if all
variations are possible, that means a duplicate of what's happening
(13:26):
here exist in at least one of those universes. So
now to say do we exist in those universes, it's
tempting to write a sci fi novel about that. We've
already done the experiments with clones. Do you know what
that experiment is no, they're called twins.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
Oh twins, Yes, exactically.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Identical, but you're not the same person. So put your
twin in another universe. Yeah, then I you will get
over yourself.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
So if we know all of this, we can see
we can see stars, we can see the aftergo of
the Big Bang. Why can we not travel to that?
Speaker 2 (14:01):
It's long gone, it's long gone.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
But we can time travel.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
You have to travel backwards in time. You put the
future that created you at risk.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
You'd muddle.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Yeah, if you hold it back time and accidentally prevented
your parents from meeting each other, you would not exist.
You would not exist. To go back in time and
prevent your parents from meeting each other, or, as was
indicated in at least one sci fi story, if you
disrupt their act of love making by ten minutes, not disrupted.
If you delay, okay, in ten minutes, some other gammy
(14:35):
would have been made, not the one that made you.
It'll probably be the same egg, but definitely a different sperm.
So the risks now. Stephen Hawking, concerned about these very
same risks, propose what he calls the time travel conjecture,
which is, we will one day discover a law of
physics that prevents backwards time travel because of all of
these problems that are inherent in doing So what is
(14:57):
time in the sequel to this Merlin book? M Merlin
answers that with it, so I can say, just wait
till the book comes. So Einstein suggested that time is
defined to make motion look simple. That's an is defined
to make motion.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
So time is designed to make sense of space.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
Yeah, that's the right way. That's a good way to
think about it. But beyond that, there is no measurement
of time without an event that repeats itself. By the way,
astro folk, we were time people. Yeah, we all your
fundamental measures of time come from us. There's the day,
there's the moons. Then there's the time time it takes
to orbit to orbit. That's a year.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
I'm excited for the sequel to your book, Merlin's to
the Universal visiting this planet, Just visiting.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
This planet, okay, knocking out until the fall.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
Read very few physicists, but the other one is Carla Ravelli.
Carla Revelli, you guys are accessible, Yeah, very accessible. He
wrote the Seven brief Lessons on Physics and these Guardian articles.
You guys, you get that's not like Kanye Drake's ex strama.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
Right. I've had people write to me and say, because
I have the book Astrophysical for people in a hurry. Yeah,
And when I titled it, I said, I'm not going
to use the word brief. It's too it's out there
and many books that have the word brief are very successful. Yeah.
The Brief History of Time is Stephen Hawking the number
one selling science book of all time. So I said,
(16:19):
I'm not going to use brief. Someone wrote to me
and said, uh, this, I think you owe Bravelli an
apology for copying it. I was like, what we like?
Then I said, do you have any idea how long
it takes to produce a book? Like?
Speaker 3 (16:36):
To call it brief would be ridiculous. It's not a
brief book because the brevity is in the eye of
the reader. And I think that actually a lot of
these books, yours included, take time to read because they
require you require me to think and then to go
back and think about all the things that I have
to unthink to think this thing that.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Can happen sometimes, right, deal with it?
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Yeah, I mean, I'm glad there's one of the chapters
in it, and he talks about in the re Valey book,
and he talks about twins, the twin paradox, the twin paradox. Exactly,
there's one twin living on a beach and one twin
living in a mountain at altitude, and those twins will
age differently.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
There are different fields of gravity. The one on the
mountain will see the one in the valley age more slowly.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
And vice versa, and the one in the valley will
see the one in the mountain age more quickly quickly.
That is because of the way that time bends. Yes,
explain it though, because I mean, is this apicable? Is
this a dumb question?
Speaker 2 (17:33):
No? No, no, it's time and space are conjoined. Yeah,
And gravity is the distortion of time and space. And
the way it distorts time is that it slows down, okay,
time as you get near it, and time speeds up
as you get far away. Okay. So we have equations
(17:53):
that guide you in understanding that you can calculate how
much time you would lose or gain.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Is this an anti aging method that you could go
to a valley and time would move slowly?
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Except you know, if you did this, you know in
the limit you go near a black hole and time
really slows down for you. This was portrayed in the
movie Interstellar, Uh huh, where they're gone for twenty minutes
and the guy was twenty years older, had gray hair
and everything, so he was waiting for them to come
back off of their time distorted coordinate system.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
I saw this conversation you were having with your friend
Brian Green, friend and colleague, and your mind was blown
by something he had said to you over lunch, which
was around whether or not wormholes or a structure kind
of for space time.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, remember that correctly. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
And then there's a viral clip on TikTok and it
ends with your other colleague saying, you know, it's time
for some weeks week.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
That was my co host.
Speaker 3 (18:51):
Yeah, say exactly a joint for this conversation or something like that.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
Yeah, because it was entangled particles in the vacuum of space.
If they're connected by wormholes, then wormholes may be the
actual stitches in the fabric of space time itself.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Explain what a wormhole is.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
It's what you think it is. We're here in this
in the now. Yeah, and then a wormhole opens up,
you step through and you're in a different time in
a different place.
Speaker 3 (19:17):
So it is a mode of time travel, yes, a
little bit.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
So I want to put research on wormholes, not rocket drive.
So a quick anecdote, I was in the Charlotte airport
and I have to go from a big plane to
a little plane, okay, and I swear I walk three miles.
It might have been only a half mile, but it
felt like three miles. So I get to my destination
and I thought I'd be clever geek, and I tweeted,
(19:42):
can't wait until there's wormholes. That way, all gates will
be adjacent. So I thought that, yeah, that's great. I
like quality geek tweet. And in this, by the way,
wherever you are on the geek spectrum, they're geekier people
than you.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Okay, and you can find them without wormholes.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
It's just on Twitter infinite. In the threat, it says
doctor Tyson, the day we have wormholes, you won't need airports. WHOA, Yeah,
just got out geeked.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
And you would just like, how would you move through
a wormhole? Would you have to find that specific space
time moment?
Speaker 2 (20:16):
Imagine a wormhole where you connect a wormhole between the
back of your refrigerator and the grocer it's all you
need more milk, and they just put the milk in.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
But could you just create wormholes?
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Ideally we would make one, and you need a negative
gravity force to prop it open because this naturally wants
to collapse on itself, and we don't know what would
happen if you were in there and it collapsed while
you were there. That would be weird.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Yeah, is your mind still blown by this wormhole idea?
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Yes, I would say, and less so than in the moment.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
But yeah, so a year later, Oh yeah, they're still
thinking about and you still think it's we need to
have research on wormholes for this reason, and there is
there a budget for wormhole reason we.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Need we need negative gravity matter, and we don't have it.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
We don't have it, and are we close to having it?
Speaker 2 (21:06):
I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
And is there who writes the budgets for things like
find Is there a line item in our government like
find negative gravity matter?
Speaker 2 (21:16):
We don't even know million dollars if it exists.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Okay, very quickly on horoscopes because to the point of
people's tangled minds. I am in the intersection of ven
diagram of people who have multiple degrees and read the
Cosmo astrology page. Does that worry you about me?
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Only if you wanted to become ahead of NASA, But
otherwise there are plenty of jobs for you in the
world where you can read your horoscope and it won't
matter at all.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
But when I read your book, I saw that you
have taken my entire my stars. I'm a scorpio.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
Oh you got to that part of the book and
you have.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
Taken away the scorpio is no longer a month. It's
like a week.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Me, not you.
Speaker 3 (21:55):
So how did that happen? Is that about time?
Speaker 2 (21:57):
It's about Earth on its axis. Earth is spinning, as
we know, it's also tipped, and if you ever played
with tops, you might remember that they possess so they spin,
but then they wabblebb okay, So the Earth wobbles, and
that wobbling over twenty six thousand years, shifts the correspondence
(22:22):
of the constellation and the month associated with it, and
it shifts it through completely a full twelve months. So
every two thousand years or so, the Sun passes through
a different constellation than the astrological charts would have you believe.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
So horoscopes are not real.
Speaker 2 (22:44):
There are many reasons for them not being real. That's
among them.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
That's among them.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
It's a hoax perpetrated on adults. So I shouldn't say hoax.
Hoax implies that the people perpetrating it know that. Yeah,
I think they believe. I think there are people who
propagate this who fully believe it. Yeah, And so then
there's no real guilt there.
Speaker 3 (23:06):
And so there's no explanation for the fact that I,
as a Scorpio, connect more I believe with cancer people.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So I've seen descriptions of the zodiac, yes, where it
says these are twelve prominent constellations in the sky. You
said you were what scorpia? You're Scorpion and you connect
with cancer?
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Yeah, okay, I like to date cancer, okay? Or sometimes Aris?
Speaker 2 (23:27):
Is that better or worse than any other dating app
we might have? I don't know. But the I just
did the calculation before I came today, Oh, that the
four brightest stars in the constellation Cancer are actually quite
dim and then may be as many as five hundred
stars brighter than the brightest star in the constellation Cancer,
(23:50):
which makes it a dull, boring and uninteresting constellation.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
So I should stop dating cancer. You've just expanded my
dating pool, Neil. This thank you for that service. When
it comes to dating, are my expectations keeping me single?
I'm named Araza host of Smart Girl Dumb Questions, and
this is the sponsored dumb question brought to you by Tinder.
So forty percent of people who find dating difficult say
(24:14):
that they can't meet someone who meets their expectations. But
is the problems supply or demand? It's easy to build
a checklist for what we want six' five blue, eyes
maybe some kind of specific zodiac, Sign but researchers have
found that people are really bad at knowing what they
want or. Need in, fact the science kind of sucks
at it. Too in one, study for, example researchers ask
(24:36):
daters to identify their own traits and also identify the
traits they were looking for in other, PEOPLE i eat
their dating, expectations and then they ran it through this
machine learning. Algorithm they turned out they could predict one
way attraction at around twenty, percent that, is who would
be liked or who would like, Somebody but when it
came to two way, attraction the algorithm was not. Good
its success rate was less than one percent because it
(24:58):
turns out the actual best predictor of compatibility is not
your expectations but your. Experiences, now of course that doesn't
mean you should throw all your expectations out the. Window of,
course you deserve to date somebody that treats you, well
that makes you feel. Safe yet a graduate degree may
not be the best predictor of, That and it could
be a good time to slide over that location filter
or give that short king a second, glance because when
(25:19):
it comes to, dating our experiences are more important than our.
Expectations so the important thing is to actually start going on.
Dates and a great place to start dating Is. Tinder
it starts with a. Swipe you can explore all the
possibilities for. Yourself Get tinder today and start. Dating and
(25:42):
wormholes would wormholesles? NO i think we should go.
Speaker 2 (25:46):
BACK i figure out a way to pry a pathway
through spacetime that connects to otherwise very distant, Parts and
when you do, that you just step through and you're
in another place in. Time the two most famous current
ways that's done is In Doctor strange in The marvel
universe And rick And morty in The cartoon.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
Universe i'm not familiar With rick And.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Morty that means your audience is not. Geekified it's a.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
GEEK i mean my audience might BE i might not
be the best leading. Indicator you just.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Lost you just lost The rick And. Morty rick has
portals through space time and he goes to other, universes other,
galaxies and half of those shows are More he's interacting
with other life forms that are brilliantly conceived to be
different from us in ways That hollywood perennially fails at.
(26:44):
Doing all the aliens In, hollywood it's got a, head two,
eyes and those armsferent there's a little thing on the.
Forehead it's, like really, really most life On earth looks
nothing like. Humans, yes and we HAVE dna in. Common
now you're going to bring something from another planet and
(27:06):
walk and with a.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Mouth you, know such limited imagination.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
Exactly So rick And morty is unlimited imagination as as
it conceives of life.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
Forms so these wormholes, though so these two conceptions of.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
It here's a, wormhole gun shoots it and opens up a.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Hole oh so that's, okay so you could find but
it's not like a wormhole.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Identifier, no Worm they're not going to be naturally in the. Universe, no,
okay they want to collapse on. Themselves so you need
negative gravity to the, open which we don't.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Have so wormholes they wouldn't. Exist we need negative, gravity.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Uh to create a, substance, right.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Yeah negative gravity substance to create and stabilize a.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Wormhole gravity brings space time, together, yes and a wormhole
you're prying it. Apart so you need the opposite of
what gravity is to make that.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Happen that was a very clarifying.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Sentence tracking your tangled mental.
Speaker 3 (27:57):
That really help. Me, Okay so gravity brings.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
It, together just untangled one little. Bit, yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (28:04):
Okay a negative gravity will will suspend that and then
allow you to pass and then through a. Wormhole you
could go to other universes.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
In, principle but that would could be dangerous because in
those universe might have slightly different laws of. Physics, okay
and stepping into, it you collapse in a pile of
goo because the, forces the molecular forces might not.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
COMPORT i could go to other, galaxies, oh, definitely, definitely galaxies, easier,
okay and other, dimensions other.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Dimensions we don't know how to go to other.
Speaker 3 (28:32):
Dimensions and what is a.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Dimension it's interesting how we have such an intuitive understanding of.
Dimensions we never think about. Them have you imagined a
future with flying? Cars of course everybody. Does why would
you want a flying car less?
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Traffic?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Okay? Good, yeah when you're out on the open road
driving seventy miles an, hour are you, saying, GEE i
WISH i had a flying? Car, No, no you're only
thinking about it near. Cities when you're in traffic and
you got a place to, be you just want to
up and go in the car on the. Road you
(29:04):
are stuck in two. Dimensions, yeah you can change lanes
left and. Right that's one, dimension and the other dimension
is just forward and. Back so driving is a two dimensional.
Exercise in a flying, car you enter a third dimension
and bypass these hapless souls who don't have a flying. Car, yeah,
(29:25):
okay do we together on? That we're?
Speaker 3 (29:27):
Together. Okay so that's three, dimensions so.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
That you can move the idea of a flying car
and just, say when you want to bypass the, traffic
you want to go to another dimension to do. So
in that, regard The New York City subway is a flying.
Car you're stuck in dimension you go into another, dimension
and this case is, down not, up and there's a whole, other,
(29:51):
whole entire transportation system that does not get stuck in that.
Traffic that's a flying.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Car BUT i think the difference IS i can see
those dimensions like the dimends you're talking.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
About i'm warming you.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
Up, okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Because you that tangled you eat. Horoscopes IF i went straight,
there this wouldn't have. Happened, OKAY i Gotta i'm gonna
make sure we're on the same. Page, okay.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Good SO i don't believe they're. REAL i just read.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Them, so, yeah this is easy to. Understand, correct we
are on the same. Page, okay let's go back to two.
DIMENSIONS i have a, desk, yeah AND i still have. Paper,
Okay SO i lay paper out on the desk and
THEN i run out of desk. Surface so what do you?
Do put it on the?
Speaker 3 (30:29):
FLOOR i, could, Yeah or you can stack them on
top for each.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
Other, yeah that's a third. Dimension stacking is is a third.
Dimension that's what you. Got, Okay so, no watch on
the pape on the on my, DESK i, said sixteen
sheets of. Paper let's say, yes let's say twenty four by.
Five NOW i can Stack how many pages CAN i
stack into the third? Dimension? Yeah UNTIL i hit the? Ceiling, right,
(30:57):
Okay oh my. Gosh, Look and how much more room
there is in three dimensions than there is in two?
Dimensions of, course you got? Me, yeah. Okay so now
we're in a. Room the room is a three dimensional,
room AND i put boxes in this. Room now the
room is, full and, someone a hyperdimensional being, says just
go into the fourth dimension and you can fit millions
(31:19):
of boxes. There AND i, say where is the fourth?
Dimension it is at a perpendicular line to. YOU i
already have my perpendicular. Lines they trace the three dimensions
of this. Space we cannot conceive of what direction that
fourth dimension is any more than the ant can know
what up.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Is, okay so we're just. Ants we're three d, ants
the two d, ants and there's Some is there a
four d? Ant is? That is it possible the fourth?
Dimension don't?
Speaker 2 (31:47):
Know that's really, interesting? Right? Yeah if you're actually two,
dimensions you have no, Thickness so you would be this,
flat your flat, membrane and so anyone who sees you
would only see your. Outers they'd have to cut you
open and peel back your outer contour to see what's.
Inside so let's seal that. Back we are three dimensional
(32:09):
people who are completely transparent to four dimensional. Beings you
have an outer. Perimeter we call it. Skin, yes, okay,
YEAH i would love to write a sci fi story
where the hospital is the surgery is a four dimensional
room and you go in there and the doctors remove the. Tumor,
(32:31):
yeah and they never cut you open to do, so.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Because it's just your.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Flat they're accessing you through the fourth. Dimension so surgery
they just go in and pluck it, out it, out
and there's no no evidence of Any.
Speaker 3 (32:44):
That would be.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Good when you start thinking about, dimensions it's a fascinating.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
World and you think they're infinite. Dimensions it could.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Be cosmologists say there might be ten dimensions in which
to embed everything they need to account for in The
Big bang and follows, it but we can't see the
other dimensions because they're tightly curled. Up the idea with
the higher dimensions is that they might be there right
but not entirely accessible to, Us and.
Speaker 3 (33:09):
It's possible that there's life on those other. DIMENSIONS i don't.
Speaker 2 (33:13):
See why?
Speaker 3 (33:13):
Not, yeah why? Not we, can we can conceive of.
It my last Guest Cleo. Abram do you Know Cleo?
Abram she has a show Called Huge If true on
YouTube and, ANYWAYS i end every show asking what the
guest doesn't know about with the guest is quote unquote
dumb about and she, asked where are the? ALIENS i
want to ask you about this BECAUSE i feel every
(33:34):
Time i've seen you asked about, aliens this. Happens what's
happening in front of me right, now which is that?
YOU i feel like you.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
For the question what you're interpreting my, Face.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
I'm interpreting your face billions of a second. Ago i'm
interpreting that, actually but four billions of a second. Ago
but you seem to be skeptical about alien, sightings ABOUT
Uap Unidentified aeral phenomena OR, ufo both the.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
Signings i'm skeptical of how people interpret.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
Them how do you think people interpret?
Speaker 2 (34:03):
Them they think they're visiting aliens from outer, Space and
an account of people seeing aliens is more often than
not an account of some lights in the sky behaving
badly to the fact that fifty years ago there was
no end of accounts typically extracted via. Hypnosis no end
of accounts of people having been abducted by. Aliens in
(34:24):
the era of the, smartphone those accounts have gone to. Zero,
really because you could film an encounter with. Aliens, yes
it would go viral.
Speaker 3 (34:31):
Instantly we have the ability to have proof now.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
Correct so that skepticism is people's, accounts that's.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
All are aliens? Real do aliens?
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Exist we don't have evidence yet of, them but there's
no reason to doubt.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
It if they were to. Visit what would you be
most embarrassed about them seeing on our?
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Earth, WELL i don't know what they would. DO i
can't think like an. Alien but there's a COMIC i
think it was in The New yorker. Show two cave
men facing each other in a, cave and one says
to the, OTHER i don't get. It my water is,
pure the air is, clear all of our food is.
(35:08):
Organic yet none of us lives past Thirty those are.
Cavemen now let's go to eighteen. Forty everything they ate was,
organic the water ramp. Heure half of everyone born was
dead by thirty. Five fast forward to. Today if you
die before, ninety your obituary is going to have to
(35:29):
account for. That, somehow not just your old, age not
just old. Age you're, like how did he? Die explain?
Yourself explain, Yourself explain. Yourself explain. Yourself and in The
New York, times for, example the OBITUARIES i marked when
they started giving the cause of death for people over.
Eighty so that meant we understood, aging we understood the
(35:52):
death of someone who's. Old and it's a reportable bit of.
Information LIKE i, said if you die before, eighty people
want to know. Why when one hundred and, fifties one
hundred and seventy years, ago it was half the people
were dead by thirty. Five so the point is today
we live in a world where we have overvalued the
significance of the food we eat relative to what role
(36:16):
science has played to increase.
Speaker 3 (36:18):
Our, longevity and what is the technology that has enabled
us mostly to.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
Lookitation, vaccines preventive, medicine knowing what role exercise plays in
your cardiovascular. Health we have still a long way to.
Go WHEN i was in seventh, GRADE i wrote a
book report On ponce De leone and The fountain Of.
Youth so it's A spanish explorer And i'm looking at
it AND i, say this is a full grown. Adult
(36:43):
BUT i was a geek kid since age, Nine, yes
which WHY i can have this. Thought this is a
full grown.
Speaker 3 (36:48):
Adult were you non geek before?
Speaker 2 (36:50):
NINE i was just? Regular, okay? Yeah after, NINE i
got my death. Groove Now i'm reading it and it,
said there's a full grown adult who sales across an,
ocean believing that there's a fountain from which you drink
and then you will live. Forever AND i thought to,
myself what the f how Could he's a grown? Man,
(37:14):
right this is not a fairy. Tale he's a grown.
Man how could he think? This and everybody thought, that
and SO i was so disappointed in adults not. That
but THEN i, said all that was five hundred years,
ago and now, today this one food is all you
need to. Eat here's the miracle, food here's a miracle.
Drink don't do any of, this do this one. Thing
(37:36):
AND i, said this Is ponce a De leon all over.
Again this is the secret to. Longevity it wouldn't have
to just be. Food could do. This in, fact any
ad on YouTube that has the words this in, IT
i don't think on it because they want to leave
you dangling at the.
Speaker 3 (37:51):
This, right you were missing. This the thing you're missing out.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
On this is irresistible. Clickbait What i'm saying is maybe
all that will ultimately be shown to have an important
difference on the, Edges but that's not What god is
living two and three times longer than our great great.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
Grandparents, okay, aliens that's. Aliens back to that's, aliens BECAUSE i,
so here's my. Thing is it possible that the aliens
are in a different.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Dimension, well that would be a way for you to
still say they're aliens with no possible evidence of their. Existence.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
Okay. Sure by the, way do you think aliens speak? Math?
Speaker 2 (38:25):
Yes, yes, yes that's how you'd have to communicate with.
Speaker 3 (38:29):
Them That Caveman New yorker cartoon that you're talking, About
you and meet, alien alien comes, here and you would, say.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
YEAH i would find ways to show symbol if they,
see to check what their retinue of senses. Are if
they hear but don't, see you need other ways to do, This.
Okay and maybe they see in a different wavelength of.
Light they could see infrared rather than, visible so i'd
have to you'd have to assess. This, yes then you
work within their.
Speaker 3 (38:53):
Senses but it's definitely. Math it's Not, English, no espaniol is.
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Definitely not any language On. Earth and NOW i feel
bad about. This when the Movie Arrival yeah came the
government shows a physicist and a linguist to communicate with the,
alien AND i, said, no you want a cryptographer and an,
astrobiologist not a linguist and a. Physicist and then WHEN i,
(39:19):
POSTED i JUST i felt.
Speaker 3 (39:20):
Bad people thought you were anti.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
Linguist linguists are hardly ever in. MOVIES i have no
shortage of astrophysicists in. Movies every space movie has an
actual physicist in there, Somewhere and so THEN i felt.
Bad cast in, Shade, yeah it was their day in the.
Speaker 3 (39:36):
Sun we got to send the right people in the
circumstances you don't want to. Send i'm sorry, linguist but,
like we don't want to send the wrong.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
Person, YEAH i don't need your. Culture.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
No in twenty, TWENTY i produced an interview With Elon,
musk and he talked about how we needed to be
a multi planetary space faring. Civilization do we need to
be a multiplanetary space faring that.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
That makes very good news paper? Headlines you'd expect that
spoken of someone who's in the business of making rockets
and launching, things sending people. Places So i'm not surprised by,
That and that idea goes back some ways Or Carl
sagan was a big fan of becoming a multi planet.
(40:20):
Species so why would you do that.
Speaker 3 (40:23):
Because you believe that there is some scarcity on This,
earth some abundance to be hot, outside or some expansion
of our population that requires, it.
Speaker 2 (40:32):
Or more likely in those, scenarios that it could put
our species at risk if all our eggs were in
one basket and a killer asteroid comes or a virus or. Whatever,
okay that's the main, motivation other than just the exploration
part of. It you can go, there explore and then
come back to go there and stay a big. Driver
(40:53):
there is that way we protect the. Species. Species, YEAH
i have a way more practical view of the. WORLD
i don't mind people thinking. THAT i just think it's
it's a solution to a non. Problem every scenario you
come up, WITH i can put life On earth at
risk to solve. It seems to me to be easier
(41:14):
than terraforming marsn't shipping a billion? People do suppose we
suppose we trash our. Environments, yeah and we Need earth
two point. Zero that's not an asteroids being in our own, bathtub, right,
okay this time cooping in their, bathtub right, yeah, Okay
so why not that if we have the power of
geoengineering to Turn mars Into, earth then we have the
(41:40):
power to Turn earth back Into. EARTH i can't think
of a reason why we would have to do. THAT
i can think of a hundred reasons why we would
want to do, It but every reason that people give
for having to do, it, YEAH i don't find. CONVINCING
i want to do it BECAUSE i like.
Speaker 3 (41:57):
Exploring one of the reasons why we want to do,
it and it feels sometimes imperative is, competition, competition not
just amongst, species but within our own. Species we want
to be in The moon before other countries are at The.
Moon we want to be at the In mars before
other countries are In. Mars we want to take up
as much Of mars as we. Can territorial domination it's a.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
Driver it's a, driver especially among.
Speaker 3 (42:17):
Men yeah, yeah well, YEAH i mean it'd be interesting
if we had more female leaders to see if they
too would have to save incentives actually.
Speaker 2 (42:26):
Really big ones in the past. Century, yeah they have
been just like. Men.
Speaker 3 (42:30):
YEAH i was going to, SAY i think a lot
of the things that we think are just male and.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
Females Margaret thatcher de Were.
Speaker 3 (42:36):
Gandhi there's that book that's like men are From, mars
women are From venus or. Whatever it turns out that
it's like.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
POWER i think those women succeeded because they were succeeding
in a man's, world and they have to be like
a man to do. So let's say you're in a
traffic and someone cuts someone else, off and then a
person jumps out of the car and yells at the other.
Person there's a ninety nine percent chance that's a, man
not one.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
Hundred but not In New york necessary because it's a
Man's we're all In New York.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
City and the funny thing, is to, me men like
complaining about women's emotions and their. Hormones, yeah century centuries
doing that without actually looking at ourselves and, saying how
does testosterone manifest as a hormone on our? Behavior how
many bar fights break out between women versus? Men is
(43:21):
that socialization or is it? Hormones, yeah you could say
it's SOCIETAL i, Suppose but this territorial. Thing, yeah this
is not, genderized but just the idea that if aliens
exist anywhere in the, universe how come they haven't? Visited? Right,
okay you can do a calculation that if you visit
other star, systems you figure out how to make rockets
(43:44):
they can fit other star, systems even if it takes
one hundred years to get. There then you get there
and you build a, factory and you build two more.
Ships then they go to two other star system and
then they go to. Four give yourself a very relaxing
time to make that. Happened you could do it in
one hundred million. Years the universe is billions of years. Old,
(44:05):
Okay so if you run that, calculation you can, say
If amlias did it at, all they should have occupied
every planet in the. Galaxy where are? They this is
the Famous fermi. Paradox an argument against The fermi paradox
is whatever urge you have to want to take control
of a planet is self, limiting as we say in,
(44:26):
physics because you reach a point where, okay now half
the planets are. Going but now this urge is so,
STRONG i want your. Planet it's self. DESTRUCT i want your, planet,
okay and then they fight each other and the entire system.
Implodes and that actually already happened On earth with the
age of.
Speaker 3 (44:46):
Colonization lots of talk About russia And china and outer
space and the space competition With russia And. CHINA i
think That. India india's got this big space program right,
now And i've been impressed by the stride that The
indians are making an outer Space are you impressed by?
Speaker 2 (45:03):
That what impresses me is not that they've made the, strides,
yeah but that the strides were unthinkable even just a
few decades. Ago they're accomplishing what other space faring nations are. Accomplishing.
Yeah so we're all, Human So i'm not differently, impressed,
yeah for what they've done relative to anybody else doing.
It what impresses me When i'm impressed is where were
(45:26):
you twenty years? Ago, yeah thirty years, ago and where
are you? Now india was the first to land, safely
softly on the south pole of The. Moon The indian
headlines Were indian lands is the fourth country to land
on The. Moon that's not the. Headline it is the
first country to land softly at the south.
Speaker 3 (45:44):
Pole and what's up With india in outer space because
of the speed with which they have gotten, here are
they going to get elsewhere? Faster you? Think or or you,
know there's national.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Pride never underestimate the value of national pride and national.
Security security is a code word for protecting. Yourself but
also if you feel like being an, aggressor you have
the power to do. So SO i say security Because
i'd rather we were secure rather than it's a that's
the peace nick in. Me In india a few years
(46:15):
before they tomahawked out one of their satellites from more a.
Bit it's called a kinetic. Kill you would do that
if the satellite is failing or you don't want. To
and So india did, that after The United states did,
it After russia did, it and After china did, It
and So Prime minister gets on and, says we do
(46:37):
this for peaceful you, know there's the peace. Argument, yeah
this is the beginnings of people's access to. Space one
thing that concerned me deeply When india landed on The South.
POLE i don't know if you know that it had a.
ROVER i.
Speaker 3 (46:52):
SAW i don't know what it.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Is, yeah, okay so it's a rover and so there's the. Rover,
yes the emblem in The indian, flag here's the Central.
Yeah and one of the icons of The Space agency
were embedded in the rovers, wheels so that as it
(47:14):
rolled on the dusty, soil these. Imprints but they came in.
Peace but, wait but. Wait and the sad part of
my concern is it's Something americans would. SAY i know
we would say, It so how CAN i get mad
if somebody else is going to say so on the?
(47:35):
Internet because people were dancing in the streets when, yes oh, yes,
okay there was On twitter or wherever it first landed
on X because as you, know The pakistani flag has
The muslim and the and the and the. Star this posting,
said In india we have our flag on the. Moon
(47:58):
In pakistan they have the moon on the. Flag did
you have to go? There you, know it'd be something.
Different If pakistan wars big as idea and they had
active then it would be kind of a. Fun it
would be trash talk.
Speaker 3 (48:13):
In the, way punching, down punching, down.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
That's what you're. Doing AND i WAS i was saddened by.
Speaker 3 (48:18):
THAT i want to talk to you about how technology
changes your what you, Do how DO ai and quantum change.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
Astrophysics, well there's certain problems that become tractable that were
previously only things we could. Approximate If i'm going to
model what happens to a rotating galaxy that has hundreds
of billions of, stars my computers in the nineteen seventies
couldn't do. That, well let me model galaxy using one hundred.
Stars maybe ables something about one hundred stars that will
(48:45):
give me insight to a billion. Stars maybe maybe. Not
so much of our effort over the years is approximating
the reality because the computing power can't match the. Reality
with quantum, COMPUTING i can model all the, stars by the,
way every, star every, time every star moves the gravitational,
(49:05):
configuration but everything is.
Speaker 3 (49:07):
Different, yeah it can calculate.
Speaker 2 (49:08):
That calculate. That then there's gas. Clouds how do you
calculate a gas? Cloud it's not a discrete. Object there
are bits and pieces of molecules moving, around subjected to
radiation forces and magnetic forces and rotational forces and sheer.
Forces oh my, gosh we love. It, okay bring it.
Speaker 3 (49:24):
On is it possible that we live in a? Simulation?
Speaker 2 (49:27):
Yes and my best evidence for that is just when
things are kind of, stable let's have the leader of
the free world be A New York city real estate.
Developer there's got to be someone simulating us throwing that
in just for their.
Speaker 3 (49:42):
Entertainment that's Your your best evidence for simulation Is Donald.
Speaker 2 (49:46):
Trump wouldn't have to just be. That and then so
now he's not in, office and then he comes back
one and then we Have. Biden things are pretty. Stable
we need a.
Speaker 3 (49:56):
Pandemic pandemic, well, YEAH i, THINK i, say and Then
biden becomes a little less. STABLE i say.
Speaker 2 (50:02):
THAT i think one argument for a simulation is how
how periodically something extraordinary happens in the. World the world
doesn't just stay in a stable chaos Chaosk and if
you ever played these simulation, games that's what you, want
because that's where it's more.
Speaker 3 (50:18):
Interesting that's where it gets.
Speaker 2 (50:19):
Interesting. YEAH i used to play Sim city and every
now and Then godzilla would walk across the, city maybe
fires and everything we've, broken And godzilla is not, real
but it's metaphor for an assault on the, city which
is exactly what nine to eleven. Was it was an.
Assault it's Not. Godzilla but when you're simulating the fire,
department the police. Department Un, yes what is tax money?
(50:41):
Doing are people?
Speaker 3 (50:42):
Unhappy my Friend ian has a list of reasons why
he believes the world is a. Simulation they include.
Speaker 2 (50:47):
Things like, wells wells w what's?
Speaker 3 (50:49):
Wells the idea that you like put down on there's,
water emergency broadcast, system just like things observable phenomenon that
seem odd and. Simulation like for, me like all things
drilling are. That it's like reminds me of being in
a video game where Like Mario, kart like you, Know
mario hits the thing and then a mushroom comes out
and he gets.
Speaker 2 (51:09):
Bigger uh.
Speaker 3 (51:09):
Huh that seems like we're living in a. Simulation just then.
Speaker 2 (51:12):
Natural so he's saying there's no law in the universe
that says if you, dig you get. Water so when you,
dig you get. Water clearly somebody put it. There OH
i need some, energy let's put oil.
Speaker 3 (51:23):
There, yeah, exactly like, oh let's put the sludge into a.
Car will power a. CAR i mean it's kind of,
Odd like the whole thing is.
Speaker 2 (51:29):
Odd, Okay so it's Like, minecraft where you just through
stuff there and you do it and you build a little.
Speaker 3 (51:34):
World Sea chuck we don't even need.
Speaker 2 (51:35):
Weed, okay that's the.
Speaker 3 (51:37):
Thing but how would we find out if we are
in a, simulation how would we?
Speaker 2 (51:40):
Know there are? Ways, okay one has been. Suggested so
gamma ray. Bursts these are pulses of gamma rays from
the universe that summer higher energy than. Others, yeah and
if you find it's the highest energy of anything we've
ever leasured of. Anything if we find an edge to,
that where above, that there's no, more that could be
(52:02):
the edge of the. Simulation because you can't simulate something to.
Infinity you have to put some edges on. It like
The Truman, show it looks like a sky and, clouds
but he goes out there and then it's a. Wall,
right it's the Wall up until then it was, fine,
Right but if you explore this is what exploration. Does
(52:22):
it probably annoys the, Programmers, yeah because we're reaching for
the edge of what you thought we would ever.
Speaker 3 (52:30):
Acquire so then mars could be good good as, well
good because it pushes the. Edge, sure or it could
just be fall into the line of the. Simulation they
want us to go, There.
Speaker 2 (52:40):
The simulation would not need you would not want. It
if you are the simulator to simulate everything if no
one was looking at. It If i'm, digging you'd only
simulate What i'm digging. Too in the spot Where i'm,
DIGGING i don't have to simulate it over there because
you're not digging over. There so that greatly improves the
computing power of the simulation when you localize it the
(53:01):
only places where people are granting it. Attention here's a
way to consider. This when we look in the universe
in the search for an intelligent, life that comes with
a big assumption that whatever we find would agree that
we are. Intelligent but who declared that we're intelligent?
Speaker 3 (53:17):
Ourselves we?
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Did?
Speaker 3 (53:18):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (53:19):
What? What? Okay and what's the closest species to? Humans?
Speaker 3 (53:21):
Monkeys?
Speaker 2 (53:22):
Chimpanzee? Chimpanzees, yeah how smart is a? Chimp it's one
PERCENT dna difference between. Us we have The, james, webspace
telescope and philosophy and art and. Music they have none of. It,
right stack boxes and reach a. Banana, now if you're,
religious you might, say what a difference that one percent
make makes we're? Special? Yeah or you take another, View
(53:43):
maybe the difference between stacking boxes and reaching a banana
and The james webspace telescope is as.
Speaker 3 (53:48):
Small, yeah it's like a one to three.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
Percent as that one percent you, say come, ON, ti sack. It,
well imagine because our toddlers can stack boxes and. Banana
so now imagine a life form that's one percent beyond
us in the. Universe, yeah on that same intelligence, scale
what would we look like to?
Speaker 3 (54:05):
Them we look like. Chimpanzee we would look like.
Speaker 2 (54:08):
Chimpanzee, yes our most brilliant achievements would be accomplished by their.
Toddlers little Alien timmy, Comes, oh what did you do
today from? School? OH i composed a sonnet and derived
the principles of. Calculation that's so. Cute put it on the. Refrigerator, sure.
Speaker 3 (54:27):
That's so.
Speaker 2 (54:28):
Sad so my point, is, yeah they could have Created
earth as a literal aquarium terrarium for their own, amusement
with us as life forms upon, it and we would
never know until we hit the.
Speaker 3 (54:44):
Edge until we hit the, edge and then maybe we
would find.
Speaker 2 (54:46):
Out unless they're so smart they know we're not even
going to live for the.
Speaker 3 (54:49):
Edge, okay you've been so generous with your. Times i'm
going to try to get you out of. Here when
do a lightning, round, okay And i'll keep the questions lightnings. Purple, okay,
Great why are you so good at communicating or or actually,
better why do other scientists suck at? Communicating they, Do i'm,
sorry not all of.
Speaker 2 (55:05):
That it's not valued in the. Field there's no test
for it in THE. PhD, yeah that's like, saying why
do construction workers suck at? Communicating it's not it's not
the core of the, function it's not part of the
it's not part of the, job and so. So AND
i would say some fraction of my colleagues may be
higher than in the, population are on the on the.
(55:26):
Spectrum and when you're on the, SPECTRUM i don't care about. You,
YEAH i have my own, thoughts AND i care about
my lab. Equipment and so you, know you can't put
a camera in front of that person and expect them
to be cheery eyed and smiley and with. Eyebrows you
can't expect. That, yeah AND i While i'd rather be
in the, lab.
Speaker 3 (55:43):
Thanks thanks Doctor.
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Tyz, yeah, Yeah i'd rather be in the, lab But
i'd be irresponsible IF i never left.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
It as an educator and having this value of being
able to, communicate how do you assess our relationship to
act and the skepticism around science and expertise right, Now.
Speaker 2 (56:04):
Yeah it'll just implode society and then we'll recover from it.
EVENTUALLY i think The United states is good at reacting
to perceive. Threats there are other countries that do not
have this problem of the mistrust of, science and we'll
just watch them ascend, economically because innovations and science and
technology are the engines of tomorrow's economy in every, sector
(56:26):
including things like. Farming we make more food on less
land with fewer farmers than ever. Before it's because of.
Science so we'll just watch other countries rise. Up AND
i think we have more to fall before we realize.
That and it's, sad but you, Know i'm trying to
do ALL i can to prevent.
Speaker 3 (56:42):
It it's.
Speaker 2 (56:43):
Hard the communication, HELPS i, Think, yeah so, HERESY i
protect my. EGO i say to, myself as bad as it,
is maybe it would be much worse IF i were
not doing my. Thing that's WHY i.
Speaker 3 (56:53):
Say that's why we can't let you time travel and undo,
yourself because then you wouldn't be able to hear be
here and teach. Us you updated and re release your book.
Speaker 2 (57:02):
Order to the twenty first, century thirty five.
Speaker 3 (57:03):
Years between its publication and its. Update in that, time
we discovered a lot of things The hubbles. Telescope what
in the next thirty five years are we going to?
Discover what do you what do you likely to?
Speaker 2 (57:14):
Think like, physics we have a good handle on. That,
yeah because budgets get, allocated space probes get, Designed we
have a we have a decadal survey right that we
invoke and that guides us in the decades that. Follow
So i'd like to know if there's life anywhere On,
mars even below the. SURFACE i want to know if
there's life swimming In jupiter's Moon, europa which as a
(57:35):
frozen outer shell and an ocean of liquid water that's
been liquid for billions of. Years there's more water there
than all the water In earth's. Oceans SO i think
the question about life in the, universe microbial or, otherwise
will be answered in the next thirty years BY.
Speaker 3 (57:51):
Nasa all, right last question for every GUEST i have
on the show is what do you not? Know what are?
You what Is Neil deGrasse tyson dumb? About if?
Speaker 2 (57:58):
Anything, oh Anytime i'm in the company of someone who
knows anything THAT i don't. Know that's ALL i want
to talk. About, yeah, YEAH i have a curiosity of
everything THAT i don't. Know and if they're an expert
on like cricket legs or whether there's a chef Or
i'm all there.
Speaker 3 (58:15):
Must be very frustrated for you to be a.
Speaker 2 (58:17):
Guest then, ye yes it is because then everyone asked me, questions,
Right AND i don't mind that Because i'm an. Educator
but that's not my preferred dinner, party. RIGHT i prefer
to sit me next to someone who's GOT i don't.
Care they could be a, preacher they could be an oil.
Driller i've got.
Speaker 3 (58:32):
Questions, okay give me a. Question something you want to
know that you wish that you could go to a
dinner party to night and sit next to someone who could.
Answer what's a specific.
Speaker 2 (58:40):
Question, oh let's say it's a construction. Worker, okay how
did they get the crane to the top of the?
Speaker 3 (58:46):
Building how did they get the CRAZY.
Speaker 2 (58:49):
I didn't see them put it up. There it's fifty stories.
Speaker 3 (58:52):
Up, yeah there there's probably a crane left or.
Speaker 2 (58:54):
Something i've never seen. IT i would ask, them do you.
Speaker 3 (58:57):
Think that in another universe somewhere out there there's A
Neil deGrasse tyson that knows this and the.
Speaker 2 (59:00):
Infinite, YEAH i, mean it's just these are.
Speaker 3 (59:03):
Things there could be a construction, Worker Neil Degrass tyson
and another.
Speaker 2 (59:07):
Plan sure That neil would certainly know the answer to that.
Question the curiosity would be all up in.
Speaker 3 (59:13):
It thank you so, Much neil for doing. THIS i
so appreciate. It oh, SURE i feel less tangled now
thanks to.
Speaker 2 (59:19):
You your mental roadways have been. Unraveled thank.
Speaker 3 (59:22):
You thank you for that.
Speaker 2 (59:24):
Service you have it, anytime all.
Speaker 3 (59:32):
Right that conversation With Neil Dagrass tyson just definitely untangled
my mind a little, bit or it totally bent it
out of. Shape i'm not. SURE i have a lot
of processing to. Do but three quick reflections on. That
one on this question of if we're living in a,
SIMULATION i Found neil's answer to that to be beautifully
scientific and mathematical in some, way like there's no evidence against,
(59:52):
it and there's potentially some evidence for, it so it's.
Possible AND i found even more compelling his answer to
the second question of how would we you know this
kind of testing of the edges of the simulation to
see if it. Breaks it is hugely destabilizing for me
to think. About, second and on the subject of, destabilizing
it was really sad By neil's answer about our growing
(01:00:12):
distrust and skepticism about the. SCIENCE i had hope for
something more, hopeful but he instead was, like, well we
might implode as a. Society we have a lot further to.
Fall that just sucks because if you think, about you,
know other parts of that, conversation the great leaps we've
made as a, society our ability to kind of double
or triple our, lifespan our ability to detect and deflect.
ASTEROIDS i, mean these are huge innovations that relied on
(01:00:35):
a belief in, science an investment in. Science it's hard
to think that we're going to let those things. Go,
thirdly and on a much lighter, NOTE i want to
make a plea to the negative gravity matter funders around the,
world whatever universities or researchers are doing. THIS i, mean
the idea of wormholes like These rick And morty guys
have to just like avoid airports, entirely and to have
(01:00:56):
food delivered into my refrigerator sounds like the best. Thing
it also is really kind of, trippy really, trippy and
if we get, There i'm going to know for sure
that we're in a. Simulation that's it for this week
of Smart girl Dumb. Questions i'm going to go find
a wormhole AND i hope you'll be back with me Next.
Friday today's show was produced With Sickbird, Productions Jade, Watson Diana,
(01:01:16):
DaCosta And Kess, agnew with additional editing by
Hey, everybody, I'm Joe McCormick of Stuff to blow your mind. Today,
we want to play you an episode of a new
show called Smart Girl Dumb Questions, hosted by journalist Naima Raza.
Each Friday, she unpacks complex ideas by asking simple questions
to big thinkers. This one is with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
They talk about.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Dimensions, wormholes, time travel, and brick and Morty. So enjoy
the episode and you can find more episodes of Smart
Girl Dumb Questions wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
There was an asteroid set to meet the Earth in
the year twenty thirty two.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Well, that's to put very politely, to meet the Earth, Jemmy,
they collide. Yes, we can say meet and greet the Earth.
The press ran with the fact that the likelihood of
it hitting Earth went up briefly from like one percent
to three percent.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
That was it, eh, But one percent is not that
different from three percent, so you're saying it still might
happen a.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Third And then it went Yeah, I feel.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Like it's a very binary situation, this meeting of Earth
and the asteris.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Well, the value of that news cycle, yes, is people
were trained to follow the scientific progress on the number.
That's an important way that the public should be interacting
with the moving frontier of science. I'm happy that we
went through that episode because that will happen more frequently
(01:33):
going forward. We have better data, better telescopes to see
asteroids of that size in that way.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Yeah, Previously we wouldn't have even known the difference between
the zero and the one percent, even.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Known it was there. That we might have known it
was there, But when it was much closer.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Like Bruce Willis Ben Affleck close, well, you.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Don't get me started on arm again. That movie violated
more laws of physics per minute than any other psych
fiction movie ever. Plus an asteroid the size of Texas
we would have discovered two hundred years ago. That's the
good thing about asteroids that might kill us, right if
I met, They are the largest and the easiest to detect.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Smart girl dumb questions. Hi, welcome to smart girl dumb Questions.
I'm named Areza. You're a smart girl with the dumb questions,
and that telling me the good thing about the asteroids
that might kill us, that they're larger and easier to detect.
Is Neil deGrasse Tyson. He's an astrophysicist, a science communicator,
(02:38):
an educator, the director of Hayden Planetarium here in New York,
and someone whose job it is to help make sense
of the universe really for people like me who just
don't get it all the time. Neil has written several
best selling books, including Astrophysics for People in a Hurry
and Merlin's Tour of the Universe. And I was so
excited to talk to Neil because of all the things
(02:58):
that I'm dumb about, science really top the list. Like
I took biology in school, but I couldn't look when
the frog got dissected. And I took chemistry, but all
I remember is kind of honk, like hydrogen bonds once
and oxygen bonds twice and nitrogen bonds three times, and
oh my god, I cannot believe I am even telling
you this on a podcast. So my dumb question for
Neil Degrass Tyson was are we living in a simulation?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Like?
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Is this whole universe a simulation? But before we got there,
I had to understand what the universe was. And we
started small, like Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star small, and we
worked our way up into galaxies and universes and multiverses
and aliens, and this idea of wormholes which maybe allow
you to cross through space time that blew my mind.
Here's my conversation with Neil de grass Tyson. So I
(03:45):
want to start with the building blocks the stars.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
I'm your servant in this interview.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
You're not anyone servant.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yeah, I'm a servant of your curiosity. And by the way,
it's not for you to judge whether you're asking a
dumb question.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
Okay, oh, you want to challenge the whole premise of
my show.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
It's whether I give a dumb answer.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
The dumbness is in the eye of the answer.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Yes, because an educator should be sensitive to how a
person's tangled mental pathways might be interpreting the world. And
then that one gurgles up as a question. Then I
deeply care about how you thought about the world, and
(04:31):
that puts the onus on me to figure out a
way to respond such that what I share with you
is received by your learning receptors.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Are you untangling me or are you just sending it
down the tangled pipe?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
Navigating a tangled path? Sometimes I'm a badly tangled from life. Yeah, right,
And so you got to navigate that.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
At the end of this, I would like an assessment
of how tangled I am compared to the most tangled
person you're.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
In fact, when I post on social media and I
see the comment thread, I take that as a neurosynaptic
snapshot of how people think about words. I've used, phrases,
I've offered, content I've delivered. If I think I posted tweet,
let's say, and if I think it's funny and no
one laughs, it's not funny.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
It's not funny. It's like your own personal fMRI all
of America or all of the world.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Very good, Yeah, that's my it's a it's a social
media fMRI.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
Okay, Twinkle Twinkle, little Star. I was at a roller
skating rink the other.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Day, Neil, and that's a thing.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
That's a thing, Okay, a roller skating disco. I was
told by somebody there that when you see a star,
you look at the star. That star is so far away,
both in distance and time, that the light I am
seeing from that star means that the star may not
even be there anymore? Is that corrector? And oh, I
can tell by your eyes that this person.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
So you learned this at a disco roller skating rink. Yes,
we're all that's where you are. The great wisdom of
the world is dispersed. It's completely correct, but misleading, all right. So,
because it takes light time to travel between any two points. Yeah,
the world you see is not as it is, but
(06:18):
as it once was when the light from that object
left En Routier retina. I see you right now, not
as you are, but as you were four billions of
a second ago. Now I'm not going to then say
I wonder if she's still alive, because four billions of
a second is small compared with your life expectancy. So
(06:40):
too it is with stars. There's stars that are thousands
of light years away. Yes, it could have died, but
stars live billions and in some cases trillions of years. Ah,
So a thousand year delay that you're not going to
catch it in the last thousand years of its life. Now,
of course some stars do explode, but at a rate
(07:04):
of maybe two per century per galaxy.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
How long does it take us to know with the
telescopes and whatnot.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
The information about the death of the star is on
route through space. So let's take the sun. Right, If
someone plucks the sun out of the middle of the
Solar System. You wouldn't know for eight minutes and twenty seconds,
because that's how far correct still feel the gravity. We'd
still orbit even though there's nothing there, right, we'd still
do well, you wouldn't know there's nothing there. So eight
minutes and twenty seconds go by, and then we plunge
(07:35):
into darkness. The temperature of the Earth descends, and we
fly off at a tangent lost in interstellar space.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
That's the first page of your book. This is like
what happens if the Earth were to stop rotating. And
your answer is to pin yourself down unless you want
to go at what is it, eight hundred miles per hour?
I mean, my mind is broken by your book.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
That's a good thing. And then you reassemble it into
the laws of physics that guide.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
The universe at the rollers category apparently back to the
building walks.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
Okay, to start at the beginning of the universe.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Now, I don't want to start the universe because the
universe is expanding. So if we start at the beginning,
by the time we finish, it will be even bigger
than we could get to. Okay, you can look into telescopes,
you can see what's happening out there. We cannot see
the Big Bang.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
That's correct, but for reasons that are not obvious.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
But yeah, yeah, we see the afterglow, correct. So what
are the reasons that are not obvious?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Is a barrier? The light can't pass through that afterglow?
It's opaque to light.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
And there's no technology that we're developing to try to see.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
It's not using light. Before the universe had this opaque barrier,
it was active in ways that we have some telescopes
that can see through the barrier to those early times,
and so one of them is gravitational waves.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Do we know what happened before the Big Bang?
Speaker 2 (08:53):
No, but we have ideas.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
Do we know that something for sure happened before the
Big Bang? Is it possible at the Big Bang?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Oh, for sure, But we have ideas.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
What are the ideas?
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Our universe is a natural expression of a larger entity
called a multiverse that's making universes forever, and there could
be an infinite number of multiverses. All that does is
move the question earlier right way? Do we get the
multiverse from? Right?
Speaker 3 (09:21):
Where did that start?
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Right? So this is this is a big challenge with
origins questions because the origin of something typically, if it's singular,
you can't compare it to the origin of something else. However,
let's look back in time the origin of the Earth. Peoples, Oh,
we'll never know the origin of the Earth because you
can't go back in time. This was logged, lobbed against
(09:44):
astronomers centuries ago. Until we have telescopes that look at
other star systems being born and you can see them
making planets. So now I have comparisons, and I said, oh,
that must be how our planet got made. These are
planets around a star that looks just like ours. And
when it's not singular, you can do you can compare
and contrast. We found galaxies being born, so now our
galaxy is not the whole thing. We only have one universe.
(10:06):
We don't know how it was foreigned, but maybe there
are other universes that we can compare it to.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
Do you have a hunch or is that not a thing?
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Going with the multiverse. It feels right and it looks
good coming out of the equations. We're not just pulling
it out of our ass. The equations give us the multiverse.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Okay, yeah, And all of this is rooted in math.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Yeah, that is well, well, it's served by math, I
should say, it's rooted in what the universe really is,
whatever that is, and we invent math. And it's one
of the great miracles of science that this invention we
call math has anything at all to do with the
with the universe that we didn't invent.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
It's like our language for trying to understand the universe's
math is.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
That is the language of the universe, the way Spanish
is the language of Spain.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Well, this is great because I interviewed two eleven year
olds recently and they said they feel everything they learn
is not useful.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
The problem is, when we're in school, the expectation is
that what you learn is what will be useful to
you later. That implies that the only way we function
is by applying discrete knowledge to discrete problems. But no,
most of the ways you function is you're applying wisdom
and insight to a problem you've never seen before. And
(11:20):
where does that wisdom and insight come from the collection
of all of the things you learned, Yes, but also
all the ways you learned. You are a turn paper
on Julius Caesar. Well, you had to research that these
are methods, tools and tactics didn't even matter. There was
that about Julius Caesar that you had to go through
that exercise to arrive at that term paper, and that
(11:41):
is the exercise that you carry forth. Math and physics
are the embodiment of a new kind of brain wiring
that teaches you not just what to know about the universe,
but how to think, how to think about knowing it
even correct.
Speaker 3 (11:56):
Yeah, and that's good news. I didn't tell them that
the process by which they were learning it's going to
be invaluable. But I didn't get to wisdom and insight.
But I like that distinction.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
There's knowledge, wisdom, and insight. Yeah, and they're they're more
refined versions of themselves. And also you can learn this
and learn that and learn this, and then later on
in life see a connection that no one else did.
One could define genius in just that way. The genius
is a person who sees what everyone else sees and
(12:24):
thinks what no one else has thought.
Speaker 3 (12:26):
Do you think you're a genius?
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Other than in that phrase definition, I never used the word.
It's a label, and when you start labeling people, it's
shorthand for I don't need to know anything more about you.
Because I've given you this label. I know everything I
need to know about you, so I don't even have
to have a conversation. So I'm just anti label.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
So Big Bang happens before the Big Bang. It's possible.
We don't know exactly what happened, but it's possible that
there are these multiverses a multiverse sorry, crinking.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Out our universes such as ours.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
Yes, and so there could be infinite universe. Y do
we exist in other universes?
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Well, it depends on what you mean by that. They
would likely if this model is accurate. Yeah, then there
are enough universes so that there's an entire universe where
all events are playing out exactly as they are in
this universe. Or you know, we're having this conversation except
on the interviewer and you're the subject. But if all
variations are possible, that means a duplicate of what's happening
(13:26):
here exist in at least one of those universes. So
now to say do we exist in those universes, it's
tempting to write a sci fi novel about that. We've
already done the experiments with clones. Do you know what
that experiment is no, they're called twins.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
Oh twins, Yes, exactically.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Identical, but you're not the same person. So put your
twin in another universe. Yeah, then I you will get
over yourself.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
So if we know all of this, we can see
we can see stars, we can see the aftergo of
the Big Bang. Why can we not travel to that?
Speaker 2 (14:01):
It's long gone, it's long gone.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
But we can time travel.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
You have to travel backwards in time. You put the
future that created you at risk.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
You'd muddle.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Yeah, if you hold it back time and accidentally prevented
your parents from meeting each other, you would not exist.
You would not exist. To go back in time and
prevent your parents from meeting each other, or, as was
indicated in at least one sci fi story, if you
disrupt their act of love making by ten minutes, not disrupted.
If you delay, okay, in ten minutes, some other gammy
(14:35):
would have been made, not the one that made you.
It'll probably be the same egg, but definitely a different sperm.
So the risks now. Stephen Hawking, concerned about these very
same risks, propose what he calls the time travel conjecture,
which is, we will one day discover a law of
physics that prevents backwards time travel because of all of
these problems that are inherent in doing So what is
(14:57):
time in the sequel to this Merlin book? M Merlin
answers that with it, so I can say, just wait
till the book comes. So Einstein suggested that time is
defined to make motion look simple. That's an is defined
to make motion.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
So time is designed to make sense of space.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
Yeah, that's the right way. That's a good way to
think about it. But beyond that, there is no measurement
of time without an event that repeats itself. By the way,
astro folk, we were time people. Yeah, we all your
fundamental measures of time come from us. There's the day,
there's the moons. Then there's the time time it takes
to orbit to orbit. That's a year.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
I'm excited for the sequel to your book, Merlin's to
the Universal visiting this planet, Just visiting.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
This planet, okay, knocking out until the fall.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
Read very few physicists, but the other one is Carla Ravelli.
Carla Revelli, you guys are accessible, Yeah, very accessible. He
wrote the Seven brief Lessons on Physics and these Guardian articles.
You guys, you get that's not like Kanye Drake's ex strama.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
Right. I've had people write to me and say, because
I have the book Astrophysical for people in a hurry. Yeah,
And when I titled it, I said, I'm not going
to use the word brief. It's too it's out there
and many books that have the word brief are very successful. Yeah.
The Brief History of Time is Stephen Hawking the number
one selling science book of all time. So I said,
(16:19):
I'm not going to use brief. Someone wrote to me
and said, uh, this, I think you owe Bravelli an
apology for copying it. I was like, what we like?
Then I said, do you have any idea how long
it takes to produce a book? Like?
Speaker 3 (16:36):
To call it brief would be ridiculous. It's not a
brief book because the brevity is in the eye of
the reader. And I think that actually a lot of
these books, yours included, take time to read because they
require you require me to think and then to go
back and think about all the things that I have
to unthink to think this thing that.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Can happen sometimes, right, deal with it?
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Yeah, I mean, I'm glad there's one of the chapters
in it, and he talks about in the re Valey book,
and he talks about twins, the twin paradox, the twin paradox. Exactly,
there's one twin living on a beach and one twin
living in a mountain at altitude, and those twins will
age differently.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
There are different fields of gravity. The one on the
mountain will see the one in the valley age more slowly.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
And vice versa, and the one in the valley will
see the one in the mountain age more quickly quickly.
That is because of the way that time bends. Yes,
explain it though, because I mean, is this apicable? Is
this a dumb question?
Speaker 2 (17:33):
No? No, no, it's time and space are conjoined. Yeah,
And gravity is the distortion of time and space. And
the way it distorts time is that it slows down, okay,
time as you get near it, and time speeds up
as you get far away. Okay. So we have equations
(17:53):
that guide you in understanding that you can calculate how
much time you would lose or gain.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Is this an anti aging method that you could go
to a valley and time would move slowly?
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Except you know, if you did this, you know in
the limit you go near a black hole and time
really slows down for you. This was portrayed in the
movie Interstellar, Uh huh, where they're gone for twenty minutes
and the guy was twenty years older, had gray hair
and everything, so he was waiting for them to come
back off of their time distorted coordinate system.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
I saw this conversation you were having with your friend
Brian Green, friend and colleague, and your mind was blown
by something he had said to you over lunch, which
was around whether or not wormholes or a structure kind
of for space time.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, remember that correctly. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
And then there's a viral clip on TikTok and it
ends with your other colleague saying, you know, it's time
for some weeks week.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
That was my co host.
Speaker 3 (18:51):
Yeah, say exactly a joint for this conversation or something like that.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
Yeah, because it was entangled particles in the vacuum of space.
If they're connected by wormholes, then wormholes may be the
actual stitches in the fabric of space time itself.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Explain what a wormhole is.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
It's what you think it is. We're here in this
in the now. Yeah, and then a wormhole opens up,
you step through and you're in a different time in
a different place.
Speaker 3 (19:17):
So it is a mode of time travel, yes, a
little bit.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
So I want to put research on wormholes, not rocket drive.
So a quick anecdote, I was in the Charlotte airport
and I have to go from a big plane to
a little plane, okay, and I swear I walk three miles.
It might have been only a half mile, but it
felt like three miles. So I get to my destination
and I thought I'd be clever geek, and I tweeted,
(19:42):
can't wait until there's wormholes. That way, all gates will
be adjacent. So I thought that, yeah, that's great. I
like quality geek tweet. And in this, by the way,
wherever you are on the geek spectrum, they're geekier people
than you.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Okay, and you can find them without wormholes.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
It's just on Twitter infinite. In the threat, it says
doctor Tyson, the day we have wormholes, you won't need airports. WHOA, Yeah,
just got out geeked.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
And you would just like, how would you move through
a wormhole? Would you have to find that specific space
time moment?
Speaker 2 (20:16):
Imagine a wormhole where you connect a wormhole between the
back of your refrigerator and the grocer it's all you
need more milk, and they just put the milk in.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
But could you just create wormholes?
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Ideally we would make one, and you need a negative
gravity force to prop it open because this naturally wants
to collapse on itself, and we don't know what would
happen if you were in there and it collapsed while
you were there. That would be weird.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Yeah, is your mind still blown by this wormhole idea?
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Yes, I would say, and less so than in the moment.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
But yeah, so a year later, Oh yeah, they're still
thinking about and you still think it's we need to
have research on wormholes for this reason, and there is
there a budget for wormhole reason we.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Need we need negative gravity matter, and we don't have it.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
We don't have it, and are we close to having it?
Speaker 2 (21:06):
I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
And is there who writes the budgets for things like
find Is there a line item in our government like
find negative gravity matter?
Speaker 2 (21:16):
We don't even know million dollars if it exists.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Okay, very quickly on horoscopes because to the point of
people's tangled minds. I am in the intersection of ven
diagram of people who have multiple degrees and read the
Cosmo astrology page. Does that worry you about me?
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Only if you wanted to become ahead of NASA, But
otherwise there are plenty of jobs for you in the
world where you can read your horoscope and it won't
matter at all.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
But when I read your book, I saw that you
have taken my entire my stars. I'm a scorpio.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
Oh you got to that part of the book and
you have.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
Taken away the scorpio is no longer a month. It's
like a week.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Me, not you.
Speaker 3 (21:55):
So how did that happen? Is that about time?
Speaker 2 (21:57):
It's about Earth on its axis. Earth is spinning, as
we know, it's also tipped, and if you ever played
with tops, you might remember that they possess so they spin,
but then they wabblebb okay, So the Earth wobbles, and
that wobbling over twenty six thousand years, shifts the correspondence
(22:22):
of the constellation and the month associated with it, and
it shifts it through completely a full twelve months. So
every two thousand years or so, the Sun passes through
a different constellation than the astrological charts would have you believe.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
So horoscopes are not real.
Speaker 2 (22:44):
There are many reasons for them not being real. That's
among them.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
That's among them.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
It's a hoax perpetrated on adults. So I shouldn't say hoax.
Hoax implies that the people perpetrating it know that. Yeah,
I think they believe. I think there are people who
propagate this who fully believe it. Yeah, And so then
there's no real guilt there.
Speaker 3 (23:06):
And so there's no explanation for the fact that I,
as a Scorpio, connect more I believe with cancer people.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So I've seen descriptions of the zodiac, yes, where it
says these are twelve prominent constellations in the sky. You
said you were what scorpia? You're Scorpion and you connect
with cancer?
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Yeah, okay, I like to date cancer, okay? Or sometimes Aris?
Speaker 2 (23:27):
Is that better or worse than any other dating app
we might have? I don't know. But the I just
did the calculation before I came today, Oh, that the
four brightest stars in the constellation Cancer are actually quite
dim and then may be as many as five hundred
stars brighter than the brightest star in the constellation Cancer,
(23:50):
which makes it a dull, boring and uninteresting constellation.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
So I should stop dating cancer. You've just expanded my
dating pool, Neil. This thank you for that service. When
it comes to dating, are my expectations keeping me single?
I'm named Araza host of Smart Girl Dumb Questions, and
this is the sponsored dumb question brought to you by Tinder.
So forty percent of people who find dating difficult say
(24:14):
that they can't meet someone who meets their expectations. But
is the problems supply or demand? It's easy to build
a checklist for what we want six' five blue, eyes
maybe some kind of specific zodiac, Sign but researchers have
found that people are really bad at knowing what they
want or. Need in, fact the science kind of sucks
at it. Too in one, study for, example researchers ask
(24:36):
daters to identify their own traits and also identify the
traits they were looking for in other, PEOPLE i eat
their dating, expectations and then they ran it through this
machine learning. Algorithm they turned out they could predict one
way attraction at around twenty, percent that, is who would
be liked or who would like, Somebody but when it
came to two way, attraction the algorithm was not. Good
its success rate was less than one percent because it
(24:58):
turns out the actual best predictor of compatibility is not
your expectations but your. Experiences, now of course that doesn't
mean you should throw all your expectations out the. Window of,
course you deserve to date somebody that treats you, well
that makes you feel. Safe yet a graduate degree may
not be the best predictor of, That and it could
be a good time to slide over that location filter
or give that short king a second, glance because when
(25:19):
it comes to, dating our experiences are more important than our.
Expectations so the important thing is to actually start going on.
Dates and a great place to start dating Is. Tinder
it starts with a. Swipe you can explore all the
possibilities for. Yourself Get tinder today and start. Dating and
(25:42):
wormholes would wormholesles? NO i think we should go.
Speaker 2 (25:46):
BACK i figure out a way to pry a pathway
through spacetime that connects to otherwise very distant, Parts and
when you do, that you just step through and you're
in another place in. Time the two most famous current
ways that's done is In Doctor strange in The marvel
universe And rick And morty in The cartoon.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
Universe i'm not familiar With rick And.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Morty that means your audience is not. Geekified it's a.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
GEEK i mean my audience might BE i might not
be the best leading. Indicator you just.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Lost you just lost The rick And. Morty rick has
portals through space time and he goes to other, universes other,
galaxies and half of those shows are More he's interacting
with other life forms that are brilliantly conceived to be
different from us in ways That hollywood perennially fails at.
(26:44):
Doing all the aliens In, hollywood it's got a, head two,
eyes and those armsferent there's a little thing on the.
Forehead it's, like really, really most life On earth looks
nothing like. Humans, yes and we HAVE dna in. Common
now you're going to bring something from another planet and
(27:06):
walk and with a.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Mouth you, know such limited imagination.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
Exactly So rick And morty is unlimited imagination as as
it conceives of life.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
Forms so these wormholes, though so these two conceptions of.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
It here's a, wormhole gun shoots it and opens up a.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Hole oh so that's, okay so you could find but
it's not like a wormhole.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Identifier, no Worm they're not going to be naturally in the. Universe, no,
okay they want to collapse on. Themselves so you need
negative gravity to the, open which we don't.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Have so wormholes they wouldn't. Exist we need negative, gravity.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Uh to create a, substance, right.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Yeah negative gravity substance to create and stabilize a.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Wormhole gravity brings space time, together, yes and a wormhole
you're prying it. Apart so you need the opposite of
what gravity is to make that.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Happen that was a very clarifying.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Sentence tracking your tangled mental.
Speaker 3 (27:57):
That really help. Me, Okay so gravity brings.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
It, together just untangled one little. Bit, yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (28:04):
Okay a negative gravity will will suspend that and then
allow you to pass and then through a. Wormhole you
could go to other universes.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
In, principle but that would could be dangerous because in
those universe might have slightly different laws of. Physics, okay
and stepping into, it you collapse in a pile of
goo because the, forces the molecular forces might not.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
COMPORT i could go to other, galaxies, oh, definitely, definitely galaxies, easier,
okay and other, dimensions other.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Dimensions we don't know how to go to other.
Speaker 3 (28:32):
Dimensions and what is a.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Dimension it's interesting how we have such an intuitive understanding of.
Dimensions we never think about. Them have you imagined a
future with flying? Cars of course everybody. Does why would
you want a flying car less?
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Traffic?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Okay? Good, yeah when you're out on the open road
driving seventy miles an, hour are you, saying, GEE i
WISH i had a flying? Car, No, no you're only
thinking about it near. Cities when you're in traffic and
you got a place to, be you just want to
up and go in the car on the. Road you
(29:04):
are stuck in two. Dimensions, yeah you can change lanes
left and. Right that's one, dimension and the other dimension
is just forward and. Back so driving is a two dimensional.
Exercise in a flying, car you enter a third dimension
and bypass these hapless souls who don't have a flying. Car, yeah,
(29:25):
okay do we together on? That we're?
Speaker 3 (29:27):
Together. Okay so that's three, dimensions so.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
That you can move the idea of a flying car
and just, say when you want to bypass the, traffic
you want to go to another dimension to do. So
in that, regard The New York City subway is a flying.
Car you're stuck in dimension you go into another, dimension
and this case is, down not, up and there's a whole, other,
(29:51):
whole entire transportation system that does not get stuck in that.
Traffic that's a flying.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Car BUT i think the difference IS i can see
those dimensions like the dimends you're talking.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
About i'm warming you.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
Up, okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Because you that tangled you eat. Horoscopes IF i went straight,
there this wouldn't have. Happened, OKAY i Gotta i'm gonna
make sure we're on the same. Page, okay.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Good SO i don't believe they're. REAL i just read.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Them, so, yeah this is easy to. Understand, correct we
are on the same. Page, okay let's go back to two.
DIMENSIONS i have a, desk, yeah AND i still have. Paper,
Okay SO i lay paper out on the desk and
THEN i run out of desk. Surface so what do you?
Do put it on the?
Speaker 3 (30:29):
FLOOR i, could, Yeah or you can stack them on
top for each.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
Other, yeah that's a third. Dimension stacking is is a third.
Dimension that's what you. Got, Okay so, no watch on
the pape on the on my, DESK i, said sixteen
sheets of. Paper let's say, yes let's say twenty four by.
Five NOW i can Stack how many pages CAN i
stack into the third? Dimension? Yeah UNTIL i hit the? Ceiling, right,
(30:57):
Okay oh my. Gosh, Look and how much more room
there is in three dimensions than there is in two?
Dimensions of, course you got? Me, yeah. Okay so now
we're in a. Room the room is a three dimensional,
room AND i put boxes in this. Room now the
room is, full and, someone a hyperdimensional being, says just
go into the fourth dimension and you can fit millions
(31:19):
of boxes. There AND i, say where is the fourth?
Dimension it is at a perpendicular line to. YOU i
already have my perpendicular. Lines they trace the three dimensions
of this. Space we cannot conceive of what direction that
fourth dimension is any more than the ant can know
what up.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Is, okay so we're just. Ants we're three d, ants
the two d, ants and there's Some is there a
four d? Ant is? That is it possible the fourth?
Dimension don't?
Speaker 2 (31:47):
Know that's really, interesting? Right? Yeah if you're actually two,
dimensions you have no, Thickness so you would be this,
flat your flat, membrane and so anyone who sees you
would only see your. Outers they'd have to cut you
open and peel back your outer contour to see what's.
Inside so let's seal that. Back we are three dimensional
(32:09):
people who are completely transparent to four dimensional. Beings you
have an outer. Perimeter we call it. Skin, yes, okay,
YEAH i would love to write a sci fi story
where the hospital is the surgery is a four dimensional
room and you go in there and the doctors remove the. Tumor,
(32:31):
yeah and they never cut you open to do, so.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Because it's just your.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Flat they're accessing you through the fourth. Dimension so surgery
they just go in and pluck it, out it, out
and there's no no evidence of Any.
Speaker 3 (32:44):
That would be.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Good when you start thinking about, dimensions it's a fascinating.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
World and you think they're infinite. Dimensions it could.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Be cosmologists say there might be ten dimensions in which
to embed everything they need to account for in The
Big bang and follows, it but we can't see the
other dimensions because they're tightly curled. Up the idea with
the higher dimensions is that they might be there right
but not entirely accessible to, Us and.
Speaker 3 (33:09):
It's possible that there's life on those other. DIMENSIONS i don't.
Speaker 2 (33:13):
See why?
Speaker 3 (33:13):
Not, yeah why? Not we, can we can conceive of.
It my last Guest Cleo. Abram do you Know Cleo?
Abram she has a show Called Huge If true on
YouTube and, ANYWAYS i end every show asking what the
guest doesn't know about with the guest is quote unquote
dumb about and she, asked where are the? ALIENS i
want to ask you about this BECAUSE i feel every
(33:34):
Time i've seen you asked about, aliens this. Happens what's
happening in front of me right, now which is that?
YOU i feel like you.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
For the question what you're interpreting my, Face.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
I'm interpreting your face billions of a second. Ago i'm
interpreting that, actually but four billions of a second. Ago
but you seem to be skeptical about alien, sightings ABOUT
Uap Unidentified aeral phenomena OR, ufo both the.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
Signings i'm skeptical of how people interpret.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
Them how do you think people interpret?
Speaker 2 (34:03):
Them they think they're visiting aliens from outer, Space and
an account of people seeing aliens is more often than
not an account of some lights in the sky behaving
badly to the fact that fifty years ago there was
no end of accounts typically extracted via. Hypnosis no end
of accounts of people having been abducted by. Aliens in
(34:24):
the era of the, smartphone those accounts have gone to. Zero,
really because you could film an encounter with. Aliens, yes
it would go viral.
Speaker 3 (34:31):
Instantly we have the ability to have proof now.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
Correct so that skepticism is people's, accounts that's.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
All are aliens? Real do aliens?
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Exist we don't have evidence yet of, them but there's
no reason to doubt.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
It if they were to. Visit what would you be
most embarrassed about them seeing on our?
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Earth, WELL i don't know what they would. DO i
can't think like an. Alien but there's a COMIC i
think it was in The New yorker. Show two cave
men facing each other in a, cave and one says
to the, OTHER i don't get. It my water is,
pure the air is, clear all of our food is.
(35:08):
Organic yet none of us lives past Thirty those are.
Cavemen now let's go to eighteen. Forty everything they ate was,
organic the water ramp. Heure half of everyone born was
dead by thirty. Five fast forward to. Today if you
die before, ninety your obituary is going to have to
(35:29):
account for. That, somehow not just your old, age not
just old. Age you're, like how did he? Die explain?
Yourself explain, Yourself explain. Yourself explain. Yourself and in The
New York, times for, example the OBITUARIES i marked when
they started giving the cause of death for people over.
Eighty so that meant we understood, aging we understood the
(35:52):
death of someone who's. Old and it's a reportable bit of.
Information LIKE i, said if you die before, eighty people
want to know. Why when one hundred and, fifties one
hundred and seventy years, ago it was half the people
were dead by thirty. Five so the point is today
we live in a world where we have overvalued the
significance of the food we eat relative to what role
(36:16):
science has played to increase.
Speaker 3 (36:18):
Our, longevity and what is the technology that has enabled
us mostly to.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
Lookitation, vaccines preventive, medicine knowing what role exercise plays in
your cardiovascular. Health we have still a long way to.
Go WHEN i was in seventh, GRADE i wrote a
book report On ponce De leone and The fountain Of.
Youth so it's A spanish explorer And i'm looking at
it AND i, say this is a full grown. Adult
(36:43):
BUT i was a geek kid since age, Nine, yes
which WHY i can have this. Thought this is a
full grown.
Speaker 3 (36:48):
Adult were you non geek before?
Speaker 2 (36:50):
NINE i was just? Regular, okay? Yeah after, NINE i
got my death. Groove Now i'm reading it and it,
said there's a full grown adult who sales across an,
ocean believing that there's a fountain from which you drink
and then you will live. Forever AND i thought to,
myself what the f how Could he's a grown? Man,
(37:14):
right this is not a fairy. Tale he's a grown.
Man how could he think? This and everybody thought, that
and SO i was so disappointed in adults not. That
but THEN i, said all that was five hundred years,
ago and now, today this one food is all you
need to. Eat here's the miracle, food here's a miracle.
Drink don't do any of, this do this one. Thing
(37:36):
AND i, said this Is ponce a De leon all over.
Again this is the secret to. Longevity it wouldn't have
to just be. Food could do. This in, fact any
ad on YouTube that has the words this in, IT
i don't think on it because they want to leave
you dangling at the.
Speaker 3 (37:51):
This, right you were missing. This the thing you're missing out.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
On this is irresistible. Clickbait What i'm saying is maybe
all that will ultimately be shown to have an important
difference on the, Edges but that's not What god is
living two and three times longer than our great great.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
Grandparents, okay, aliens that's. Aliens back to that's, aliens BECAUSE i,
so here's my. Thing is it possible that the aliens
are in a different.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Dimension, well that would be a way for you to
still say they're aliens with no possible evidence of their. Existence.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
Okay. Sure by the, way do you think aliens speak? Math?
Speaker 2 (38:25):
Yes, yes, yes that's how you'd have to communicate with.
Speaker 3 (38:29):
Them That Caveman New yorker cartoon that you're talking, About
you and meet, alien alien comes, here and you would, say.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
YEAH i would find ways to show symbol if they,
see to check what their retinue of senses. Are if
they hear but don't, see you need other ways to do, This.
Okay and maybe they see in a different wavelength of.
Light they could see infrared rather than, visible so i'd
have to you'd have to assess. This, yes then you
work within their.
Speaker 3 (38:53):
Senses but it's definitely. Math it's Not, English, no espaniol is.
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Definitely not any language On. Earth and NOW i feel
bad about. This when the Movie Arrival yeah came the
government shows a physicist and a linguist to communicate with the,
alien AND i, said, no you want a cryptographer and an,
astrobiologist not a linguist and a. Physicist and then WHEN i,
(39:19):
POSTED i JUST i felt.
Speaker 3 (39:20):
Bad people thought you were anti.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
Linguist linguists are hardly ever in. MOVIES i have no
shortage of astrophysicists in. Movies every space movie has an
actual physicist in there, Somewhere and so THEN i felt.
Bad cast in, Shade, yeah it was their day in the.
Speaker 3 (39:36):
Sun we got to send the right people in the
circumstances you don't want to. Send i'm sorry, linguist but,
like we don't want to send the wrong.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
Person, YEAH i don't need your. Culture.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
No in twenty, TWENTY i produced an interview With Elon,
musk and he talked about how we needed to be
a multi planetary space faring. Civilization do we need to
be a multiplanetary space faring that.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
That makes very good news paper? Headlines you'd expect that
spoken of someone who's in the business of making rockets
and launching, things sending people. Places So i'm not surprised by,
That and that idea goes back some ways Or Carl
sagan was a big fan of becoming a multi planet.
(40:20):
Species so why would you do that.
Speaker 3 (40:23):
Because you believe that there is some scarcity on This,
earth some abundance to be hot, outside or some expansion
of our population that requires, it.
Speaker 2 (40:32):
Or more likely in those, scenarios that it could put
our species at risk if all our eggs were in
one basket and a killer asteroid comes or a virus or. Whatever,
okay that's the main, motivation other than just the exploration
part of. It you can go, there explore and then
come back to go there and stay a big. Driver
(40:53):
there is that way we protect the. Species. Species, YEAH
i have a way more practical view of the. WORLD
i don't mind people thinking. THAT i just think it's
it's a solution to a non. Problem every scenario you
come up, WITH i can put life On earth at
risk to solve. It seems to me to be easier
(41:14):
than terraforming marsn't shipping a billion? People do suppose we
suppose we trash our. Environments, yeah and we Need earth
two point. Zero that's not an asteroids being in our own, bathtub, right,
okay this time cooping in their, bathtub right, yeah, Okay
so why not that if we have the power of
geoengineering to Turn mars Into, earth then we have the
(41:40):
power to Turn earth back Into. EARTH i can't think
of a reason why we would have to do. THAT
i can think of a hundred reasons why we would
want to do, It but every reason that people give
for having to do, it, YEAH i don't find. CONVINCING
i want to do it BECAUSE i like.
Speaker 3 (41:57):
Exploring one of the reasons why we want to do,
it and it feels sometimes imperative is, competition, competition not
just amongst, species but within our own. Species we want
to be in The moon before other countries are at The.
Moon we want to be at the In mars before
other countries are In. Mars we want to take up
as much Of mars as we. Can territorial domination it's a.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
Driver it's a, driver especially among.
Speaker 3 (42:17):
Men yeah, yeah well, YEAH i mean it'd be interesting
if we had more female leaders to see if they
too would have to save incentives actually.
Speaker 2 (42:26):
Really big ones in the past. Century, yeah they have
been just like. Men.
Speaker 3 (42:30):
YEAH i was going to, SAY i think a lot
of the things that we think are just male and.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
Females Margaret thatcher de Were.
Speaker 3 (42:36):
Gandhi there's that book that's like men are From, mars
women are From venus or. Whatever it turns out that
it's like.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
POWER i think those women succeeded because they were succeeding
in a man's, world and they have to be like
a man to do. So let's say you're in a
traffic and someone cuts someone else, off and then a
person jumps out of the car and yells at the other.
Person there's a ninety nine percent chance that's a, man
not one.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
Hundred but not In New york necessary because it's a
Man's we're all In New York.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
City and the funny thing, is to, me men like
complaining about women's emotions and their. Hormones, yeah century centuries
doing that without actually looking at ourselves and, saying how
does testosterone manifest as a hormone on our? Behavior how
many bar fights break out between women versus? Men is
(43:21):
that socialization or is it? Hormones, yeah you could say
it's SOCIETAL i, Suppose but this territorial. Thing, yeah this
is not, genderized but just the idea that if aliens
exist anywhere in the, universe how come they haven't? Visited? Right,
okay you can do a calculation that if you visit
other star, systems you figure out how to make rockets
(43:44):
they can fit other star, systems even if it takes
one hundred years to get. There then you get there
and you build a, factory and you build two more.
Ships then they go to two other star system and
then they go to. Four give yourself a very relaxing
time to make that. Happened you could do it in
one hundred million. Years the universe is billions of years. Old,
(44:05):
Okay so if you run that, calculation you can, say
If amlias did it at, all they should have occupied
every planet in the. Galaxy where are? They this is
the Famous fermi. Paradox an argument against The fermi paradox
is whatever urge you have to want to take control
of a planet is self, limiting as we say in,
(44:26):
physics because you reach a point where, okay now half
the planets are. Going but now this urge is so,
STRONG i want your. Planet it's self. DESTRUCT i want your, planet,
okay and then they fight each other and the entire system.
Implodes and that actually already happened On earth with the
age of.
Speaker 3 (44:46):
Colonization lots of talk About russia And china and outer
space and the space competition With russia And. CHINA i
think That. India india's got this big space program right,
now And i've been impressed by the stride that The
indians are making an outer Space are you impressed by?
Speaker 2 (45:03):
That what impresses me is not that they've made the, strides,
yeah but that the strides were unthinkable even just a
few decades. Ago they're accomplishing what other space faring nations are. Accomplishing.
Yeah so we're all, Human So i'm not differently, impressed,
yeah for what they've done relative to anybody else doing.
It what impresses me When i'm impressed is where were
(45:26):
you twenty years? Ago, yeah thirty years, ago and where
are you? Now india was the first to land, safely
softly on the south pole of The. Moon The indian
headlines Were indian lands is the fourth country to land
on The. Moon that's not the. Headline it is the
first country to land softly at the south.
Speaker 3 (45:44):
Pole and what's up With india in outer space because
of the speed with which they have gotten, here are
they going to get elsewhere? Faster you? Think or or you,
know there's national.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Pride never underestimate the value of national pride and national.
Security security is a code word for protecting. Yourself but
also if you feel like being an, aggressor you have
the power to do. So SO i say security Because
i'd rather we were secure rather than it's a that's
the peace nick in. Me In india a few years
(46:15):
before they tomahawked out one of their satellites from more a.
Bit it's called a kinetic. Kill you would do that
if the satellite is failing or you don't want. To
and So india did, that after The United states did,
it After russia did, it and After china did, It
and So Prime minister gets on and, says we do
(46:37):
this for peaceful you, know there's the peace. Argument, yeah
this is the beginnings of people's access to. Space one
thing that concerned me deeply When india landed on The South.
POLE i don't know if you know that it had a.
ROVER i.
Speaker 3 (46:52):
SAW i don't know what it.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Is, yeah, okay so it's a rover and so there's the. Rover,
yes the emblem in The indian, flag here's the Central.
Yeah and one of the icons of The Space agency
were embedded in the rovers, wheels so that as it
(47:14):
rolled on the dusty, soil these. Imprints but they came in.
Peace but, wait but. Wait and the sad part of
my concern is it's Something americans would. SAY i know
we would say, It so how CAN i get mad
if somebody else is going to say so on the?
(47:35):
Internet because people were dancing in the streets when, yes oh, yes,
okay there was On twitter or wherever it first landed
on X because as you, know The pakistani flag has
The muslim and the and the and the. Star this posting,
said In india we have our flag on the. Moon
(47:58):
In pakistan they have the moon on the. Flag did
you have to go? There you, know it'd be something.
Different If pakistan wars big as idea and they had
active then it would be kind of a. Fun it
would be trash talk.
Speaker 3 (48:13):
In the, way punching, down punching, down.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
That's what you're. Doing AND i WAS i was saddened by.
Speaker 3 (48:18):
THAT i want to talk to you about how technology
changes your what you, Do how DO ai and quantum change.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
Astrophysics, well there's certain problems that become tractable that were
previously only things we could. Approximate If i'm going to
model what happens to a rotating galaxy that has hundreds
of billions of, stars my computers in the nineteen seventies
couldn't do. That, well let me model galaxy using one hundred.
Stars maybe ables something about one hundred stars that will
(48:45):
give me insight to a billion. Stars maybe maybe. Not
so much of our effort over the years is approximating
the reality because the computing power can't match the. Reality
with quantum, COMPUTING i can model all the, stars by the,
way every, star every, time every star moves the gravitational,
(49:05):
configuration but everything is.
Speaker 3 (49:07):
Different, yeah it can calculate.
Speaker 2 (49:08):
That calculate. That then there's gas. Clouds how do you
calculate a gas? Cloud it's not a discrete. Object there
are bits and pieces of molecules moving, around subjected to
radiation forces and magnetic forces and rotational forces and sheer.
Forces oh my, gosh we love. It, okay bring it.
Speaker 3 (49:24):
On is it possible that we live in a? Simulation?
Speaker 2 (49:27):
Yes and my best evidence for that is just when
things are kind of, stable let's have the leader of
the free world be A New York city real estate.
Developer there's got to be someone simulating us throwing that
in just for their.
Speaker 3 (49:42):
Entertainment that's Your your best evidence for simulation Is Donald.
Speaker 2 (49:46):
Trump wouldn't have to just be. That and then so
now he's not in, office and then he comes back
one and then we Have. Biden things are pretty. Stable
we need a.
Speaker 3 (49:56):
Pandemic pandemic, well, YEAH i, THINK i, say and Then
biden becomes a little less. STABLE i say.
Speaker 2 (50:02):
THAT i think one argument for a simulation is how
how periodically something extraordinary happens in the. World the world
doesn't just stay in a stable chaos Chaosk and if
you ever played these simulation, games that's what you, want
because that's where it's more.
Speaker 3 (50:18):
Interesting that's where it gets.
Speaker 2 (50:19):
Interesting. YEAH i used to play Sim city and every
now and Then godzilla would walk across the, city maybe
fires and everything we've, broken And godzilla is not, real
but it's metaphor for an assault on the, city which
is exactly what nine to eleven. Was it was an.
Assault it's Not. Godzilla but when you're simulating the fire,
department the police. Department Un, yes what is tax money?
(50:41):
Doing are people?
Speaker 3 (50:42):
Unhappy my Friend ian has a list of reasons why
he believes the world is a. Simulation they include.
Speaker 2 (50:47):
Things like, wells wells w what's?
Speaker 3 (50:49):
Wells the idea that you like put down on there's,
water emergency broadcast, system just like things observable phenomenon that
seem odd and. Simulation like for, me like all things
drilling are. That it's like reminds me of being in
a video game where Like Mario, kart like you, Know
mario hits the thing and then a mushroom comes out
and he gets.
Speaker 2 (51:09):
Bigger uh.
Speaker 3 (51:09):
Huh that seems like we're living in a. Simulation just then.
Speaker 2 (51:12):
Natural so he's saying there's no law in the universe
that says if you, dig you get. Water so when you,
dig you get. Water clearly somebody put it. There OH
i need some, energy let's put oil.
Speaker 3 (51:23):
There, yeah, exactly like, oh let's put the sludge into a.
Car will power a. CAR i mean it's kind of,
Odd like the whole thing is.
Speaker 2 (51:29):
Odd, Okay so it's Like, minecraft where you just through
stuff there and you do it and you build a little.
Speaker 3 (51:34):
World Sea chuck we don't even need.
Speaker 2 (51:35):
Weed, okay that's the.
Speaker 3 (51:37):
Thing but how would we find out if we are
in a, simulation how would we?
Speaker 2 (51:40):
Know there are? Ways, okay one has been. Suggested so
gamma ray. Bursts these are pulses of gamma rays from
the universe that summer higher energy than. Others, yeah and
if you find it's the highest energy of anything we've
ever leasured of. Anything if we find an edge to,
that where above, that there's no, more that could be
(52:02):
the edge of the. Simulation because you can't simulate something to.
Infinity you have to put some edges on. It like
The Truman, show it looks like a sky and, clouds
but he goes out there and then it's a. Wall,
right it's the Wall up until then it was, fine,
Right but if you explore this is what exploration. Does
(52:22):
it probably annoys the, Programmers, yeah because we're reaching for
the edge of what you thought we would ever.
Speaker 3 (52:30):
Acquire so then mars could be good good as, well
good because it pushes the. Edge, sure or it could
just be fall into the line of the. Simulation they
want us to go, There.
Speaker 2 (52:40):
The simulation would not need you would not want. It
if you are the simulator to simulate everything if no
one was looking at. It If i'm, digging you'd only
simulate What i'm digging. Too in the spot Where i'm,
DIGGING i don't have to simulate it over there because
you're not digging over. There so that greatly improves the
computing power of the simulation when you localize it the
(53:01):
only places where people are granting it. Attention here's a
way to consider. This when we look in the universe
in the search for an intelligent, life that comes with
a big assumption that whatever we find would agree that
we are. Intelligent but who declared that we're intelligent?
Speaker 3 (53:17):
Ourselves we?
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Did?
Speaker 3 (53:18):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (53:19):
What? What? Okay and what's the closest species to? Humans?
Speaker 3 (53:21):
Monkeys?
Speaker 2 (53:22):
Chimpanzee? Chimpanzees, yeah how smart is a? Chimp it's one
PERCENT dna difference between. Us we have The, james, webspace
telescope and philosophy and art and. Music they have none of. It,
right stack boxes and reach a. Banana, now if you're,
religious you might, say what a difference that one percent
make makes we're? Special? Yeah or you take another, View
(53:43):
maybe the difference between stacking boxes and reaching a banana
and The james webspace telescope is as.
Speaker 3 (53:48):
Small, yeah it's like a one to three.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
Percent as that one percent you, say come, ON, ti sack. It,
well imagine because our toddlers can stack boxes and. Banana
so now imagine a life form that's one percent beyond
us in the. Universe, yeah on that same intelligence, scale
what would we look like to?
Speaker 3 (54:05):
Them we look like. Chimpanzee we would look like.
Speaker 2 (54:08):
Chimpanzee, yes our most brilliant achievements would be accomplished by their.
Toddlers little Alien timmy, Comes, oh what did you do
today from? School? OH i composed a sonnet and derived
the principles of. Calculation that's so. Cute put it on the. Refrigerator, sure.
Speaker 3 (54:27):
That's so.
Speaker 2 (54:28):
Sad so my point, is, yeah they could have Created
earth as a literal aquarium terrarium for their own, amusement
with us as life forms upon, it and we would
never know until we hit the.
Speaker 3 (54:44):
Edge until we hit the, edge and then maybe we
would find.
Speaker 2 (54:46):
Out unless they're so smart they know we're not even
going to live for the.
Speaker 3 (54:49):
Edge, okay you've been so generous with your. Times i'm
going to try to get you out of. Here when
do a lightning, round, okay And i'll keep the questions lightnings. Purple, okay,
Great why are you so good at communicating or or actually,
better why do other scientists suck at? Communicating they, Do i'm,
sorry not all of.
Speaker 2 (55:05):
That it's not valued in the. Field there's no test
for it in THE. PhD, yeah that's like, saying why
do construction workers suck at? Communicating it's not it's not
the core of the, function it's not part of the
it's not part of the, job and so. So AND
i would say some fraction of my colleagues may be
higher than in the, population are on the on the.
(55:26):
Spectrum and when you're on the, SPECTRUM i don't care about. You,
YEAH i have my own, thoughts AND i care about
my lab. Equipment and so you, know you can't put
a camera in front of that person and expect them
to be cheery eyed and smiley and with. Eyebrows you
can't expect. That, yeah AND i While i'd rather be
in the, lab.
Speaker 3 (55:43):
Thanks thanks Doctor.
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Tyz, yeah, Yeah i'd rather be in the, lab But
i'd be irresponsible IF i never left.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
It as an educator and having this value of being
able to, communicate how do you assess our relationship to
act and the skepticism around science and expertise right, Now.
Speaker 2 (56:04):
Yeah it'll just implode society and then we'll recover from it.
EVENTUALLY i think The United states is good at reacting
to perceive. Threats there are other countries that do not
have this problem of the mistrust of, science and we'll
just watch them ascend, economically because innovations and science and
technology are the engines of tomorrow's economy in every, sector
(56:26):
including things like. Farming we make more food on less
land with fewer farmers than ever. Before it's because of.
Science so we'll just watch other countries rise. Up AND
i think we have more to fall before we realize.
That and it's, sad but you, Know i'm trying to
do ALL i can to prevent.
Speaker 3 (56:42):
It it's.
Speaker 2 (56:43):
Hard the communication, HELPS i, Think, yeah so, HERESY i
protect my. EGO i say to, myself as bad as it,
is maybe it would be much worse IF i were
not doing my. Thing that's WHY i.
Speaker 3 (56:53):
Say that's why we can't let you time travel and undo,
yourself because then you wouldn't be able to hear be
here and teach. Us you updated and re release your book.
Speaker 2 (57:02):
Order to the twenty first, century thirty five.
Speaker 3 (57:03):
Years between its publication and its. Update in that, time
we discovered a lot of things The hubbles. Telescope what
in the next thirty five years are we going to?
Discover what do you what do you likely to?
Speaker 2 (57:14):
Think like, physics we have a good handle on. That,
yeah because budgets get, allocated space probes get, Designed we
have a we have a decadal survey right that we
invoke and that guides us in the decades that. Follow
So i'd like to know if there's life anywhere On,
mars even below the. SURFACE i want to know if
there's life swimming In jupiter's Moon, europa which as a
(57:35):
frozen outer shell and an ocean of liquid water that's
been liquid for billions of. Years there's more water there
than all the water In earth's. Oceans SO i think
the question about life in the, universe microbial or, otherwise
will be answered in the next thirty years BY.
Speaker 3 (57:51):
Nasa all, right last question for every GUEST i have
on the show is what do you not? Know what are?
You what Is Neil deGrasse tyson dumb? About if?
Speaker 2 (57:58):
Anything, oh Anytime i'm in the company of someone who
knows anything THAT i don't. Know that's ALL i want
to talk. About, yeah, YEAH i have a curiosity of
everything THAT i don't. Know and if they're an expert
on like cricket legs or whether there's a chef Or
i'm all there.
Speaker 3 (58:15):
Must be very frustrated for you to be a.
Speaker 2 (58:17):
Guest then, ye yes it is because then everyone asked me, questions,
Right AND i don't mind that Because i'm an. Educator
but that's not my preferred dinner, party. RIGHT i prefer
to sit me next to someone who's GOT i don't.
Care they could be a, preacher they could be an oil.
Driller i've got.
Speaker 3 (58:32):
Questions, okay give me a. Question something you want to
know that you wish that you could go to a
dinner party to night and sit next to someone who could.
Answer what's a specific.
Speaker 2 (58:40):
Question, oh let's say it's a construction. Worker, okay how
did they get the crane to the top of the?
Speaker 3 (58:46):
Building how did they get the CRAZY.
Speaker 2 (58:49):
I didn't see them put it up. There it's fifty stories.
Speaker 3 (58:52):
Up, yeah there there's probably a crane left or.
Speaker 2 (58:54):
Something i've never seen. IT i would ask, them do you.
Speaker 3 (58:57):
Think that in another universe somewhere out there there's A
Neil deGrasse tyson that knows this and the.
Speaker 2 (59:00):
Infinite, YEAH i, mean it's just these are.
Speaker 3 (59:03):
Things there could be a construction, Worker Neil Degrass tyson
and another.
Speaker 2 (59:07):
Plan sure That neil would certainly know the answer to that.
Question the curiosity would be all up in.
Speaker 3 (59:13):
It thank you so, Much neil for doing. THIS i
so appreciate. It oh, SURE i feel less tangled now
thanks to.
Speaker 2 (59:19):
You your mental roadways have been. Unraveled thank.
Speaker 3 (59:22):
You thank you for that.
Speaker 2 (59:24):
Service you have it, anytime all.
Speaker 3 (59:32):
Right that conversation With Neil Dagrass tyson just definitely untangled
my mind a little, bit or it totally bent it
out of. Shape i'm not. SURE i have a lot
of processing to. Do but three quick reflections on. That
one on this question of if we're living in a,
SIMULATION i Found neil's answer to that to be beautifully
scientific and mathematical in some, way like there's no evidence against,
(59:52):
it and there's potentially some evidence for, it so it's.
Possible AND i found even more compelling his answer to
the second question of how would we you know this
kind of testing of the edges of the simulation to
see if it. Breaks it is hugely destabilizing for me
to think. About, second and on the subject of, destabilizing
it was really sad By neil's answer about our growing
(01:00:12):
distrust and skepticism about the. SCIENCE i had hope for
something more, hopeful but he instead was, like, well we
might implode as a. Society we have a lot further to.
Fall that just sucks because if you think, about you,
know other parts of that, conversation the great leaps we've
made as a, society our ability to kind of double
or triple our, lifespan our ability to detect and deflect.
ASTEROIDS i, mean these are huge innovations that relied on
(01:00:35):
a belief in, science an investment in. Science it's hard
to think that we're going to let those things. Go,
thirdly and on a much lighter, NOTE i want to
make a plea to the negative gravity matter funders around the,
world whatever universities or researchers are doing. THIS i, mean
the idea of wormholes like These rick And morty guys
have to just like avoid airports, entirely and to have
(01:00:56):
food delivered into my refrigerator sounds like the best. Thing
it also is really kind of, trippy really, trippy and
if we get, There i'm going to know for sure
that we're in a. Simulation that's it for this week
of Smart girl Dumb. Questions i'm going to go find
a wormhole AND i hope you'll be back with me Next.
Friday today's show was produced With Sickbird, Productions Jade, Watson Diana,
(01:01:16):
DaCosta And Kess, agnew with additional editing by
Stuff To Blow Your Mind News
Hosts And Creators
Robert Lamb
Joe McCormick
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