Cosmic Queries – The Deep

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Hey, Star Talkins, Neil here.

You're about to listen to an episode specially drawn from our archives to serve your cosmic curiosities.

Check it out.

Welcome to Star Talk,

your place in the universe where science and pop culture collide.

Star Talk begins right now.

Today, it's Cosmic Aquarius.

That's one of our favorite forms.

Eba I love it.

Ebba Love it.

Ebba I love it.

Ebba loves it.

Ebba I love it.

And

we are, in fact, educated people.

I know.

My mom is spinning in her grave right now.

So,

but this is a Cosmic Aquarius of a topic we've never solicited before.

No, we have not.

Yeah.

And the topic is the deep, deep space, deep thoughts.

Deep questions.

Deep questions.

Well, but Chuck, you got to give it in your deepest voice.

Okay, here we go.

And by the way, we did this once.

Yes, we do.

And I think,

I think I beat you by a half a tone or something.

Yeah, just barely.

Let me hear it.

Here we go.

Deep thoughts.

Deep thoughts.

Yeah, you got me already.

Yeah.

See, I got to drink scotch the night before and smoke a cigar.

Yeah, I got to smoke a cigar and smoke and alcohol just fix that right up.

But then it becomes like a deep voice and like somewhat Harvey Feierstein.

Raspy.

Yes, it becomes raspy.

Deep thoughts.

Thoughts?

Oh my God.

If you put on the accent, deep thoughts.

Thoughts.

Scotch doesn't give you the Harvey

accent

that'd be pretty cool if it did a couple scotches uh

deep deep all right someone call me an oob

i've had too much to drink

deep all right all right let's get deep let's i like deep thoughts because deep thoughts usually there isn't a right answer so you just get to sort of play with it and see where it takes you yeah man all right so this is deep questions only all right let's do it so uh solicited from our fan base it's from our fan base and here's the question from jonathan wax

And Jonathan says, or ask,

what boggles your mind more

than the thought of endless time or the thought of endless space?

So it's impossible to truly contemplate endless time because you would spend the rest of your existence doing so.

Well,

here's

two things boggle me.

Okay.

There's a beautiful frontier of research going on in the field of neuroscience.

Oh, interesting.

So I have two questions related to that that boggle my mind.

Okay.

I'm going to write these down.

Can

the human brain

figure out the human mind?

It's a great question.

If it is the human brain that actually creates the human mind.

It creates the human mind.

That's a good question.

That's what I'm saying.

Or do you need something outside of that

that is greater, smarter, different,

so that it can come in and then understand that as its own test kitchen?

Wow.

Now, Sarah Sagan has famously said

that humans are the universe's way

to understand itself.

The universe is understanding itself through human beings.

Through humans, correct.

Without humans, there'd be no thoughts to do that.

However, that elevates us higher than I'm prepared to do so.

You think so?

Yeah.

Because who says we are the measure of what is intelligent in this universe?

Well, we do.

Exactly.

Exactly.

So that statement, that Carl Sagan statement is kind of like a cosmological Descartes.

That's like the universe, the Descartes.

Oh, I think therefore I am kind of thing.

Okay.

But it's like, we think, therefore, you are.

Oh, oh, yeah.

Oh, Chuck.

Every once in a while, I'll do something.

We think, therefore, you are.

Rather than I think, therefore, I am.

Yeah.

Oh, Chuck, that was beautiful.

Oh, thanks.

We should just end the show right now.

We ain't surpassing that talk.

Thank you for watching Star Talk.

Exactly.

It's downhill from here.

Wait, so I wonder whether there is a level of intelligence out there where we are to they what chimpanzees are to us.

That's interesting.

So for example, oh, that's terrible.

Wait, wait, wait, wait.

Oh, I hope not.

Well, you can go to a chimpanzee and say,

and say,

tomorrow morning at 8.30, let's go to Starbucks and have a cup of coffee.

Nothing in that sentence makes any sense to a chimpanzee.

Right.

Or ever will.

I'm pretty sure there's a chim Starbucks.

I'm just pretty sure there is a chim Starbucks somewhere.

I'm just saying.

You think Starbucks figured out

Starbucks has got to be selling chimps coffee somehow, some way.

Is that why they're so hyper at the zoo?

Exactly.

You know what I mean?

You go to get your coffee.

It's just like, curious, George, curious, George.

Decaf latte for curious.

Okay, sorry.

So wait, wait.

So

here's why I say that.

And I've said this many times.

I've written it, and I will tell you to your face now.

All right, good.

So, there's about 1% difference in DNA between humans and chimps.

Okay.

All right.

Yet, we like to think of ourselves as

highly superior intellectually to the chimp.

Right.

Maybe the difference in our brain power is as small as that 1% indicates.

So, that pulling termites out of a mound with a stick that was carefully chosen from a branch, right?

From a bush, maybe that

is not very far from space travel the hubble telescope right

no no wait think about it no no i know this sounds crazy no no think about it

maybe maybe look at those cute little humans and their telescopes that's what i'm saying up there look at is that a space settlement they just want okay so now watch the smartest chimp yeah that are studied in labs right that are brought and forth into chimp societies right you bring them forward and what do they do they'll stack boxes to reach a banana they might put up an umbrella they'll do some things, okay?

Have rudimentary sign length.

Our toddlers can do that.

Right.

But those are the smartest chimps.

Right.

But our toddlers do that.

Same thing with dogs.

Dogs have about.

I know.

I could do this example for dogs as well, but chimps is simpler because they're closer to us.

Even closer.

So watch.

Gotcha.

You see what you're doing.

You see where I'm going.

Okay, so watch.

If the smartest chimp equals our toddler, and there's only 1% difference in DNA between us,

let's go 1% beyond us.

Ooh.

That's scary.

That's what I'm saying.

If we go 1% beyond us in that same vector of intelligence,

then the smartest human,

they'll roll forward.

They'll take Stephen Hawking and they'll say, this human is slightly smarter than the rest because he can do astrophysics calculations in his head.

Like little Timmy over here who just came home from alien preschool.

Right.

The toddler.

The toddler.

Right.

And say, oh, you just composed a sonnet.

Isn't that cute?

Let's put it up on the refrigerator.

Oh, you just derived the principles of calculus.

Oh, isn't that cute?

That's funny.

So if

so, if the smartest human does what their toddlers can do,

their average people will have thoughts.

They will have sentences that will rise above and beyond

our most brilliant capacity to understand.

And I stay awake at night wondering whether the universe has complexities in it that are out of reach of the neurosynapses of the human brain.

Wow.

That's my answer.

So there's information out there that we just cannot conceive or personally.

We don't even know how to

access that

about it.

To get an answer.

Correct.

We don't know the answer.

We don't know the question to get an answer.

To get an answer.

Right.

And not that we don't know it because we haven't been told it yet.

No, we just can't conceive it.

Can't conceive it.

You go to a chimp and say, go to a chimp and say,

what would it be?

Oh,

something as simple as navigating the stars to get someplace.

Just can't do that.

Stars?

What?

Navigate?

What?

What?

Spaceship?

What?

Rocket?

Fuel?

What?

None of that.

None of it.

You can't even have that conversation.

Right.

So that's my point.

Now I'm thinking that this whole thing might be some type of like

science experiment by some alien kid now.

Yes.

Why Why not?

Why not?

Ugh.

We are all a simulation in an alien kid's basement who hasn't moved out of the house yet.

That's so funny.

We're the Minecraft of some other

Minecraft.

Yes.

Wow.

Wow.

Yeah.

And then when things get too peaceful and stable, they stir the pot.

Stir the pot.

They throw in a politician, a war, a crazy person, throwing things.

And then, oh, now it's entertaining.

So we're just entertainment for.

This is the best video game.

Okay.

Wow, wow.

That's a well, listen, that's a great answer to what boggles your mind.

That's a really,

it doesn't so much boggle my mind.

It upsets my mind.

Yeah, I was about to say it's very upsetting.

Are we not?

I'm mad.

I don't even know why.

Here's my one

out on this.

You're right.

Go ahead.

Because

for humans, our knowledge is cumulative.

So true.

You don't have to invent calculus.

Somebody else did that.

You just have to use it.

Learn it and use it.

So I have the feeling that we are every next generation that has sort of brilliant people contributing to our understanding of the universe, they're adding a rung to a ladder.

And then we all sort of climb up that and then just get that next rung.

And we'll climb that.

And then the next rung.

Well, with that in mind, I think that the next

evolutionary step for human beings is that we will create an intelligence greater than our own.

That's really the deal.

This scares the hell out of everyone.

Yeah.

Because that intelligence will say, we don't need you.

You know what?

And we'd have to say you're right.

That's what happened in the Matrix.

Yeah.

You are a virus on this earth.

Mr.

Anderson.

I smell you, Mr.

Anderson.

No, he was smelling Morpheus.

Oh, that's right, Mr.

Matt.

That's right.

Get your Matrix.

If you're going to go there in front of me, I'm in front of the Raw.

That's my favorite movie.

That's true.

Don't even.

Yes, he was talking about Morpheus when he was tied up in the chair.

Yes.

It's the smell.

You know what?

You got to have some really serious B.O.

for a computer to tell you you stink.

I'm just saying.

I'm just saying.

All right.

Let's get through the electronics.

So, this is Alex Gregg56 from Instagram.

And Alex Gregg says, This:

if the universe needs not make any sense to us, then what is the point of doing science?

Is science not, in fact, the discipline of trying to grasp what's around us?

And by the way, is this statement not equal to the old one, which is God has his reason to make it that way?

So just don't ask.

Of course, I never heard that expression.

But

the shorter version of that is: God works in mysterious ways.

That is so true.

Yeah, when you can't explain it, you can't explain it.

Oh, God, the Lord works in mysterious ways.

And if you can explain it using God, then you do, right?

Oh, God has blessed you.

You bless God.

Then there's a tsunami, takes out a quarter million people.

God hates you.

No one says that.

No one says that.

Why don't we say that?

We should say that.

I want to start saying, you know what?

I think God hates you.

Well, the most hateful God in our culture is the one represented on insurance forms.

Oh, that's so true.

Acts of God.

Acts of God.

Right.

It's only

very bad things.

No one says flowers bloomed in your garden.

An act of God.

No, it's tsunami took out your house.

That's it.

Now you're homeless on the street.

Act of God.

Wow.

Look at that.

This moment of God hates you, bought to you by farmers insurance.

Stay farm.

What's that one?

Nationwide.

It's not on your side.

Nationwide is on your side.

God is not.

All right.

Okay, that's enough.

So I'm going to get some hate mail now.

You hate God, Chunk.

Is that it?

Okay, sorry.

So is science in fact the discipline of trying to grasp what is around us?

Okay, so what he started, he started quoting me where I said, I opened my book, The Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, with the quote,

the universe is under no obligation to make sense to you.

What that means is

your five traditional senses, which rose up out of the Serengeti,

which help us not get eaten by lions.

They're very good at that.

They're not as good at contemplating infinity.

They're not good contemplating time scales much longer than your life expectancy.

So true.

You can't intuit billions of years.

You can't intuit infinitesimals.

There are things that are hard for us.

There are things that may even be impossible for us.

Can you picture a five-dimensional cube?

No, I cannot.

No, you cannot.

Can you picture a four-dimensional cube?

Probably not.

No, no, actually, the tesseract is close.

Yeah.

That's like a...

I can actually picture that

because I've seen a drawing.

I have a Tesseract.

Do you really?

I do.

Get out.

Yeah.

Oh.

All right.

I'll bring it in.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Let's go.

Another episode.

Another episode.

It'll be the episode of Higher Dimensions.

Sweet.

Do a whole thing on just higher dimensions.

You know, that's a good episode.

Did we do that?

Yeah.

I like that.

We did that.

We did that already.

How come I don't remember?

Man, I'm getting old.

Did I have my Tesseract in my hand?

Well, now we got to do it again.

Updated.

So I took this from Thanos.

So,

what it means is, if you are going to

deduce what is or is not true in the universe,

your senses are not the most reliable measure of whether it's true.

So true.

Because the senses give you a restricted understanding of what's actually going on in the universe.

Your eyes, you would never trade them for anything, yet they only expose your mind to a very tiny, narrow strip.

of all the electromagnetic energy that's out there.

You can't see infrared.

You can feel it as heat, but you can't see it.

Ultraviolet, you can't see that either.

You can feel that in a delayed sense by getting sunburn and skin cancer.

It's not telling you in that instant.

It's a time delay.

But keep going out.

There's infrared, ultraviolet, X-ray, gamma rays.

Can't see any of that.

But the universe is talking to you in that.

So are you going to say,

my senses give me everything that there is in the universe, and therefore it makes sense?

No.

As long as we detect things that fall outside of our senses, it's a challenge for you to declare that what we say, do, and discover makes sense.

The very statement makes sense means your senses can contemplate it, that your senses have experience.

If I let go of a ball and it floats up, you'll say that doesn't make sense.

Right.

Because your senses always told you that if you let go of a ball, it drops.

And in fact, the very statement, let it go,

not the

frozen, not the frozen version, but just let it go, means drop it.

They mean the same thing.

But that can only be true on Earth with a force of gravity pointing down.

In space, in free orbit, you let go, it just floats there.

It stays right there.

It stays right there.

So, like my problems.

Stay right there.

Yeah.

I must be in space because all my problems, somebody says drop it.

And I say, I did that

right still here.

And you let it go and it's still there.

Exactly.

So, my point is, the methods and tools of science give you a way to understand what is true without it being hinged on whether your senses think it's true.

Nice.

So, the message on Tutilitar Science are access to truth, where you can still probe the universe.

Whereas God works in mysterious ways kind of ends that conversation.

Whereas, I say, I've developed a new instrument that can see in ways humans cannot.

Oh my gosh, that opens entire worlds of investigation, entire branches of science.

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This is Star Talk with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Okay, Chuck.

Here we go.

So

this is from Probably Asleep.

That's the name of the person.

That's the the name of the person.

Okay.

I like you.

Your mama didn't like you.

How long do you think the human race will actually survive?

Wow.

I mean, there's precedent for that, right?

Well, so you can look at what is the average life expectancy of mammals, mammal species.

Exactly.

And last I checked, it was around 2 million years, something like that.

And so we've been around.

We have a long way to go.

We have a long way to go.

We've been around, you know, a couple hundred thousand years in our current anatomical form, Cro-Magnon form.

Right.

And so that means we have a long way to go.

But this presumes that the species is not smart enough to kill itself.

Well, then it's over.

It was nice knowing you guys.

Yeah, we have invented multiple ways to kill ourselves.

Yeah.

And I don't think the elephants did.

Or, you know, nobody else did this.

Right.

The mice?

No.

They're not killing themselves.

Right.

Humans?

Yes.

Yeah, maybe, maybe cockroaches invented human beings.

Why?

Because when everything's gone, they're going to be the only ones left.

And it's like, no, no, then they don't have to invent us in the first place.

What kind of reasoning are you using here?

They want everything else gone.

No, they need us to build the structures that they then move into.

And

I don't mind it.

Yeah, that makes that makes perfect sense.

Yeah, we are.

Yeah.

But so I think what he's really asking is, in your estimation, from your sage opinion,

how long do you think we will last?

I give us 20 years.

That's funny.

No, I think we're good.

This is why many people want to become a two-planet species.

Terraform Mars, send some humans there.

So if something bad happens on Earth, you still have humans somewhere else.

Wow.

That is not encouraging at all.

Not for half the people who aren't on the planet.

So if an asteroid comes, if a killer virus, if AI

gets out of hand.

So I understand seeding something with a remnant for survival of the species.

That's extraneous.

I mean, that's something that's outside of our own destruction.

You know,

even though we could stop an asteroid from hitting us, if we put the resources, we know how.

We just need a resource.

Ain't nobody doing it.

That's what I'm saying.

If we put the resources into it, we could stop even that from happening.

So what's the example you're giving?

So what do you mean?

To stop the asteroid?

No, no.

So what I'm saying is,

you know,

will we ever get to a place where the, as the Buddhist monks call it, the so-called monkey brain that causes us to do so much destructive

work to each other and to the planet, will we ever get to a place where we overcome that or we're able to train those who come behind us to overcome that?

Now, it does happen in some people.

I get it.

First, I've never heard a Buddhist monk say the phrase monkey brain.

Really?

I've never heard that.

Is this a thing?

This is a thing.

Okay, fine.

That is a thing.

I've got to attend more monasteries.

You feel a monkey brain today?

All right.

So I've heard of reptilian brain, but not monkey brain.

Yes.

Okay.

So the reptilian brain is referenced something primal that goes on within you.

So if we follow the reasoning by Steven Pinker in his book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, he studied the likelihood of you dying before maturity or dying before adulthood or just dying

at the hands of another human from early days of tribal warfare to modern days of

state-sanctioned global warfare.

And what he found is that the likelihood of you dying in that way has been dropping ever since.

So tribal warfare,

you would kill maybe a third or half of the other tribe or the entire tribe, and then you win and you get their land.

That doesn't happen today.

True.

The state surrenders before that happened.

True.

Saving the lives of the rest of the population.

If you look at, I did this just recently.

If you look at what countries had the greatest percent of their population die in the Second World War,

was it Belarus?

One of them is very high.

It's like a third.

I forgot the exact numbers, but they're high.

But they're not a half.

And you keep going down, and you get to even combat Germany, even ones that were heavily bombed, Germany, Japan,

a fraction of the total population.

That is not how it used to end in tribal warfare.

So

now consider that even so, during the Second World War, between 1939 and 1945, 1,000 humans were killed by other humans.

per hour for every hour from 1939 to 1945.

Wow.

Is that going on today?

No.

No.

No.

We're really slipping.

No, stop.

So we really got to pick up our picking just so we can bear.

So the point is, often that error is called the greatest generation.

Right.

Well, because they fought evil forces and this sort of thing.

Although my father fought in a segregated army.

So he's not thinking that was the greatest generation.

He has other outlook, other perspectives on that period.

It's the second greatest generation.

My point is,

is the greatest generation the one where the fewest fraction of everyone dies

out of hate?

We might have a lot of hate, but if the number of people who die from it is lower than ever before,

then this arc that you were hinting at, that maybe a next generation learns from the previous one, maybe that's going to work.

Europe, with all of their turbulence and turmoil, They actually haven't been at war with each other for 70 years.

Is there another 70-year period in the history of Europe where nobody was fighting anybody?

I don't think so.

Not if Twitter has anything to do with it.

What you're saying is, imagine if Twitter existed back then.

Back then, almost.

Let me tell you something.

The war wouldn't have stopped until everybody was dead.

Like, people would have said, I surrender.

A tweet would have gone out.

And they'd be like, I take it back.

Let's keep fighting.

Let's keep fighting.

I don't care.

I hate you more.

Right.

so maybe we are getting kindler kinder and gentler

uh time still needs to bear that out on a level that would please everyone but i still worry that this primal brain will always segregate us all by some arbitrary factor and thereby justify doing harm to other groups

interesting that's uh i think it was who's the comedian was it uh Franklin Ajai, one of these guys from the 70s

in the day, in the day, he was talking about who hates who in the world right and

he

and he says reading the papers and

what

in

northern ireland the protestants and the catholics are fighting each other right and they're both white yeah he said you know i don't have a chance because i'm black that's funny that's true yeah right if white people divide themselves up in that way right two christian communities killing each other right yeah and they're both white and they're both christian and they both it's over for you, brother.

It's over for everybody else.

If people can kill each other for those reasons, it's almost no hope in this world.

So, yeah, I don't know.

Okay.

Yeah, so I'm sorry.

I don't have a good answer.

No, that was a pretty good answer.

The answer is we're not going to make it.

I'd like to think we go thousands of years into the future and possibly outlive the sun.

All right.

That'd be great.

But star hopping to other planetary systems.

You know, I'm just going to say that's the way it's going to end because I won't be here.

So that's great.

Maybe.

It has been said that the first person who will never die is now alive.

What?

That's a...

Well, no, that's just how you do it.

I know what you're saying.

So they get some new thing that makes you live an extra 50 years.

So now you live to 150 instead of 100.

And then somewhere in there,

there's another thing we get.

Now you can live another 200 years.

So now the 150 goes to 350.

Now you can live 500 years.

Now you go to 1,000.

You can live 5,000 years.

So as we progress in our understanding of what ages you, if we can reverse that or prevent it from ever advancing, the person, there's someone alive today who will benefit from that.

That's pretty cool.

I like it.

So, if that happens, you better find another planet.

This is true.

Yeah.

That's the premise of a show called Altered Carbon, where people actually take their consciousness and put it into what they call a sleeve, which is the body.

So,

I think I voiceover the opening sequence today.

Oh, my God.

I think we had that conversation once where you told me that.

Yeah.

Because I told you I was afraid of it.

I don't remember if it was with the pilot or the other shows, but

I lent my voice to the cause.

Nice.

Wow.

All right.

Well, let's go to Joey 24, Joey Jr.

24.

He says this personal question.

Based on all your experiences and knowledge thus far,

personal for me or for you?

Personal for you.

Okay.

Nobody asking me anything.

He says, based on all of your experiences and knowledge thus far,

what do you think the meaning of our human existence is?

He just asked you, what is the meaning of life, according to Neil deGrasse Tyson?

Okay.

So

I,

in my next book.

Uh-oh.

Yeah, I don't, you never hear me plug my stuff.

I was going to say, here's the meaning of life right now.

Plug your book when you get a chance.

The next book is called Letters from an Astrophysicist.

You know what?

Correspondence I've had with people who've had similar angst about their existence.

Well, that's not just the book, it's not about that.

No, no, it's about all different kinds of letters you've read.

All kinds of letters, yes.

But a very recurring theme is that people want to know the meaning of life and their significance of their life in this world.

Yeah.

And some of them come from religious angles, some are secular, but everybody's got this burning issue.

Yes.

So here's how I have dealt with it.

Others will do it other ways.

Okay.

But here's how I deal with it.

I'm interested now.

Many people are in search of the meaning of life as

it's behind a tree, right?

Under a rock.

Right.

Everybody knows it's in a drawer

in the back.

Exactly.

Near the paper clip.

And

it's in that drunk drawer, too.

It's not like an underwear drawer.

So you know that drawer where you go to look for stamps and stuff.

Yeah, yeah, that drawer.

That's right.

The junk drawer.

The junk drawer.

Everybody's got a junk drawer.

Everybody's got junk.

It's near the kitchen somewhere.

Right.

So

if you are looking for meaning,

you may never find it.

So instead,

recognize that you have the power to manufacture meaning.

Create it within yourself.

That's what I do.

My meaning

for life is derived by several simple principles.

Have I lessened the sufferings of others today?

That brings meaning to me.

Because that means the world is a little better off because I was in it today.

Okay.

If after your day is over, the world is worse off, you have subtracted meaning.

I should kill myself.

No, no.

Because at the end of every day, somebody is like that mother.

But go ahead.

So

lessen the suffering of others in some way.

Right.

Doesn't mean redirect your whole life, mind, body, and soul, but if you can help someone across the street, help an aging person, do, you know, make a little child laugh, just put a little bit of joy in the world to lessen the suffering.

I also try to learn something every day.

All right.

Now,

I like being a perpetual student.

Right.

Most people hated being students.

This saddens me.

School's finished, and what do you do?

You run down the steps.

School is out forever.

Out for the summer.

That attitude captured in that song

is as though you don't want to be in school.

And what's your only job in school?

It's to learn.

To learn.

And somehow that's a chore.

Yeah.

I don't blame you for feeling that way.

I blame the school system for not instilling within us eternal curiosity, knowing that you'll spend more years of your life not in school than in school.

And so if you have curiosity, you can be a lifelong learner.

That's right.

And so I want to lessen the sufferings of others and make sure I learn something more about the world today than I did yesterday.

Nice.

And who's to say whether that extra increment of learning can help me be better at

lessening the sufferings of others?

Ooh.

So that is how I make meaning in life.

And as a result, I own thousands of books.

Thousands.

And I read a little bit.

You know, I have a little stash near my bed and I cycle them out.

Every day I try to help.

It's harder now because I get recognized.

But I try to help people every day.

Total strangers.

That's nice.

Yeah.

So you can make meaning for yourself.

Don't look for it because you may never find it.

You know, I'm going to say, as a philosophy, that is, that's a, that's, that's, that's admirable.

That's in the book.

I wrote that in the book.

Nice.

Excellent.

Excellent.

Thank you.

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From Ninja Janeet, whatever.

No, Janit, I don't know, said i keep hearing the phrase the vacuum of space how exactly is it a vacuum right okay so when i was a kid a vacuum was a physical object yes it was when i heard physicists speak of the vacuum of space i just imagined all these hoovers right in in the sky right so i didn't know that a vacuum was a thing was a was an ant it was a concept and then you make a machine that duplicates that thing.

I just didn't know that until I learned.

Okay.

So a vacuum is where there's basically no air.

Okay.

You can have objects there, but when we think of a vacuum, it's not a place where there isn't anything.

It's a place where there's no air molecules moving, typically.

All right.

Generally, you can have some, and we would still classify it as a vacuum.

You have to distinguish like a regular old vacuum or a perfect vacuum.

Right.

Now, you know what happens if there's an object and you take away all the air molecules?

The object outgases.

There are air molecules embedded in the surface of that object and they start coming out.

It's fascinating.

Then you heat it, it sends out more.

So it's very hard to make a perfect vacuum.

Very hard.

So here's an old saying:

nature

abhors

a vacuum.

These are people who've never been into space.

Most of the universe is a vacuum.

Nature loves a vacuum.

Nice.

Was I Trumpy in there?

No.

Love.

Nature loves

a vacuum.

A vacuum.

So perfect.

Preferably Trump ran vacuums.

Trump-ran vacuums.

We suck the best.

There's another saying, there's no such thing as gravity.

Earth sucks.

Have you ever heard that?

Oh, okay.

Okay.

So the point is, when there's a source of gravity, all the air wants to go to that source of gravity.

And it leaves a vacuum everywhere else.

So a vacuum is simply where there's no air.

And it's not anything deep.

The odd thing in the universe is that you have places where

gas molecules collect.

Those are the unusual places in the universe.

And they're called stars and gaseous planets and the atmospheres of rocky planets.

Nice.

Yeah, so they have a vacuum.

So, Chuck, I want to put some closure on this vacuum question.

Okay.

Okay.

This is the second, my third book I ever published.

Oh, okay.

It's called Just Visiting This Planet.

All right.

And it's a collection of Q ⁇ A.

I had a column,

with a pen named Merlin.

People would ask fun, really playful questions.

That's cool.

And it collected.

This is like decades old, but there's some timeless content in here.

Somebody asked about the vacuum.

Mm-hmm.

Can I read?

Yeah, go ahead, please.

Well, you can't read otherwise.

Okay.

Here we go.

The best vacuum you will find anywhere.

I wrote this.

I wrote this 30 years ago.

That's cool.

The best vacuum you will find anywhere, according to four out of five vacuum retailers and five out of five astronomers, is the void of intergalactic space.

But we can then ask, is intergalactic space nothing?

Hmm.

No, it still contains space.

If you feel obliged to call intergalactic space nothing, then you must invent a word to refer to the region outside of the universe.

In this location, where we presume there to be no space, there can be no nothing.

Wow.

Let's call it, we're left with no choice.

Nothing, nothing.

Nothing, nothing.

A place where there's not even nothing.

It's the nothing, nothing.

Wow.

Okay, I'm just saying.

I like that.

I'm just saying.

So, Chuck, you want some more vacuum talk?

Of course.

I feel like you just showed up at my door and dumped some dirt on my carpet.

More vacuum talk.

Okay, vacuum talk.

So, in Death by Black Hole.

Right.

Okay.

I don't remember what number of books this is.

So in the chapter on being dense.

Okay.

Okay.

That's named.

Something I know a great deal about.

The range of measured densities within our universe is staggeringly large.

We find the highest densities within pulsars, where neutrons are so tightly packed that one thimbleful would weigh about as much as a herd

of 50 million elephants.

50 million.

And then a rabbit disappears into thin air at a magic show.

Nobody tells you that thin air already contains over 10 septillion atoms per cubic meter.

Wow.

Thin air.

Thin air.

Right.

Okay.

The best laboratory vacuum changers can pump down to as few as 10 billion atoms per cubic meter.

Best vacuums.

That's the best vacuums.

In a cubic meter, 10 billion air molecules are still walking around.

Okay.

Interplanetary space gets down to about 10 million atoms per cubic meter.

While interstellar space is as low as a half a million atoms per cubic meter.

Wow, that is nothing.

Wow.

That ain't

nothing.

Okay.

500,000 atoms.

The award for nothingness, however, must be given to the space between the galaxies, intergalactic space, where it is difficult to find more than a few atoms for every 10 cubic meters.

Wow.

That wins.

That's almost

almost nothing, nothing.

That's almost nothing, nothing.

All right.

We're going to go into a deep lightning round.

Really?

We only have five minutes left.

Okay, let's go.

Okay, here we go.

This is Ja Saldana says,

right now, what should be the priority in the field field of space exploration?

Searching for life?

Searching for potential threats of another kind of search?

Or is there just no hurry at this matter at all?

Greetings from Mexico.

Mexico.

Thank you.

So what is it?

Is it

are we looking for life?

He wants my opinion.

I got an opinion.

Exploration.

Go ahead.

I got an opinion.

All right.

Go ahead.

I want to do it all.

Why not do it all?

All of the above.

All of the above.

Because the moment you do this and not that, they say, well, why are you doing doing that and not that?

Oh, because we voted that way.

But maybe you don't know why you should do that and you want to do that.

Some people want to do that.

Here's what you do.

You don't build a road just from New York to L.A.

You build roads everywhere so that, yeah, I want to visit that forest.

I want to visit

this rocky monument.

I want to do things that are not prescribed by you.

I'm going to see the biggest ball of yarn ever.

Exactly.

Right?

So what you do is you make a spaceship that is modular,

strap on different combinations of rockets.

Right.

This combination gets you to an asteroid to mine it.

This gets you to the backside of the moon.

This gets you to Mars.

So you don't prescribe what it is you're going to do next in space.

You let the creativity and imagination of all those who've ever looked up say, this is what I want to do.

And you say, here you go.

Two rockets from aisle B, a booster from Aisle C.

You're on your way.

Can I put that on a credit card?

Yeah.

That's why I got it.

Here we go.

All right.

Adam and the Airwaves wants to know this from Instagram.

How far behind do you think astronomy would be if the Earth didn't have a moon?

Wow.

Okay.

So it's not how far behind we'd be.

Right.

It's how far advanced we'd be.

Ooh.

Wow.

Okay.

So let me split this out.

I tweeted during Space Week, the 50th anniversary of the Apollo landing.

There's a saying that's common in the space circles.

It's, if God wanted us to explore space, he would have given us a moon.

Right.

Okay.

So

that's a good saying.

Yeah.

But that exploration is not astrophysicists' exploration.

That one is people going into space.

Right.

You build a rocket to go where?

You don't have a moon to visit.

All right.

If you talk about astrophysics, do you know how many stars the naked eye can see at night?

More than I can count.

No, it's about 3,000 to 4,000.

Oh, really?

Unaided, yeah.

Binoculars, it's 100 times that.

Telescopes, it's a billion times that.

But eyes, 3,000 to 4,000 stars.

Okay.

When it's a full moon out,

300 stars.

Yeah.

Right.

The moon wreaks havoc on our ability to see the rest of the universe.

So our observing schedules with huge telescopes are split according to dark time or bright time.

And if you look at, if you have bright time observations, it's the moon is up and you can only look at bright objects in the night sky.

Wow.

The deep universe only comes to us when the moon is not up.

So the moon is basically a pain in the ass.

It's a star blocker.

Wow.

Yes, star blocker.

Look at that.

That's what it is.

So astronomy would be

probably

half again more advanced because we would have had these greatest telescopes in the world looking at the night sky twice as often.

Right.

In the darkest parts of the night sky.

There you go.

Wow.

Next.

That's a damn good answer.

Okay.

This is

Eversitapur.

I don't know what this is.

Who cares?

I'm sorry.

Whoever that is cares.

Let me tell you something.

And the last time he's going to be asking you a question.

All right.

Well, you know what your name is.

I'm going to call you George.

All right.

So George wants to know this.

What is the shape of space itself?

Ooh.

That's a good question.

Well, space can be curved in the presence of matter or energy as prescribed by Einstein's general theory.

That's the theory of relativity.

And there's the oft-repeated saying,

matter tells space how to curve.

Space tells matter how to move.

So space has curvature in the presence of matter and energy.

It curves in towards it, with the ultimate expression of that, a black hole.

where it curves in and it never curves back out.

Wow.

If you want to ask what is the shape of all of space,

that's like saying, what's the shape of the universe, the observable universe?

It's basically a perfect sphere.

Wow.

Because it's your horizon.

Right.

Okay.

It's a perfect sphere the way when you're at sea, your horizon is a perfect circle, alright?

That's right.

The same distance in every direction.

That's right.

If you're just out and there's nothing but water.

And so what is the three-dimensional version of a circle?

A sphere.

A sphere.

So in space, you can see to your horizon in every direction

all at once.

It makes us think we're at the center of a sphere but that's no different from you thinking you're in the center of the ocean right just because you're in the center of your horizon ah that's next ah that's great that's good stuff right there we go for it this is uh chen yuan who says if we look if we were to look in all directions billions of light years away will we see younger universe in all directions enveloping our bigger one now

i have to rephrase that because if as you look out, you see things not as they are, but as they once were.

So you are looking at a younger and younger and younger universe.

That's the whole point of cosmology.

It allows the fact that it takes light time to reach us allows us to see what the universe was doing in the past.

If light traveled at infinite speeds, you see the whole universe as it is now with no evidence of what it was once doing.

But because it takes light time to move, you look out, you see a younger and younger and younger and younger universe until you see the Big Bang itself.

And that is 14 billion light years time away from us in every direction.

Okay.

20 billion years ago.

Right.

Okay.

And if you calculate that distance through that changing time, it's 14 billion light years to that horizon.

Okay.

So,

by the way, that horizon is much farther away today.

Right.

Because

the universe has been expanding ever since.

But you don't see it as it is today.

You see it as it was.

All right.

So,

I don't know what to say after that.

I say,

yeah.

One last question.

If you'd like to do a quick question, all right.

I got to find one that you can do really quickly.

You don't know how quick I can answer questions.

Oh, okay.

Then I'm just going to judge that.

I'm going to give you one.

Here we go.

This is

one of us.

This is basant.

Okay.

I don't care what this is.

I'm sorry.

At least try, Chuck.

Okay.

Okay, forget it.

Here, here's the name right there.

What's that say?

What's that?

Basant.

You're right.

That's what it is.

Basant Singh.

I miss the singing.

What if all the matter that we see in the universe is just three-dimensional part of some four-dimensional matter and the dark gravity is just the gravity from the 4D part that we cannot see.

I love it.

We are so blind to a higher dimension.

It could be that all the mysteries in our three dimensions plus time are completely solved by looking at this stuff from a higher dimension.

From a higher dimension.

Right.

Right.

Right.

Just, if you lived in just a flat surface, there'd be stuff going on you had no idea.

Right.

And we say, but can't you just see?

Yeah.

Just look up.

What is up?

What is that giant graphite thing making making making creating stuff?

Right on that flat surface.

On that flat surface, what is an artist?

Where is he?

He's mysterious.

It just shows up.

Right.

Right, right.

So I love it.

I that's the kind of universe I want it to be.

Because then when we figure out how to see higher dimensions, boom, we figured everything out.

Bada bing.

There you go.

All that chuck we got to run.

All right.

I enjoyed that.

We should do more.

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At Capella University, learning online doesn't mean learning alone.

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You'll also get a designated academic coach who's with you throughout your entire program.

Plus, career coaches are available to help you navigate your professional goals.

A different future is closer than you think with Capella University.

Learn more at capella.edu.