Cosmic Queries – Scars in Spacetime

Summary

StarTalk Radio: Cosmic Queries – Scars in Spacetime

Host: Neil deGrasse Tyson
Co-host: Paul Mercurio
Date: May 19, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this fan-favorite "Cosmic Queries Grab Bag" episode, Neil deGrasse Tyson and comedian Paul Mercurio field a broad mix of questions from StarTalk fans and Patreon supporters. The questions, ranging from black holes vs. wormholes to the quirks of basic physics, science fiction tropes, and cosmic mysteries, spark lively banter, deep dives, and plenty of good-natured humor. The episode’s central theme is the strange phenomena in spacetime—scars, limits, and the quirky consequences of advanced concepts like wormholes, the Roche limit, and the nature of information in black holes.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Wormholes vs. Black Holes

[05:06 – 12:29]

• Difference in Structure
  • Black Hole: Not just a "hole" in two dimensions, but in every approach direction; basically a region where gravity is so intense that not even light can escape. "It's a region of space where gravity is so high that the speed of light is insufficient to escape." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [06:13]
  • Wormhole: Theoretical tunnels through spacetime; mathematically, the "opposite" solution to a black hole is a "white hole," which would expel matter. However, no known natural process creates stable wormholes: "We know how to make a wormhole. We just don't have the right ingredients." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [08:58]
  • Negative Gravity Requirement: Opening/keeping a wormhole requires "negative gravity stuff," which is not the same as antimatter.
• Science Fiction Laughs:
  • "Do you need E-ZPass in a wormhole? And what do they charge?" — Paul Mercurio [10:08]
• Memorable Analogy: Tyson compares wormholes to elevators, transporting you between completely separate places by entering a tiny space: "The closest thing we have to a wormhole is an elevator..." [10:56]
• Feasibility: Nothing in the observed universe seems to act as "negative gravity." "Nothing in the universe looks like it's operating under negative gravity." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [12:03]

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2. Can Your Whisper Affect a Quark?

[13:04 – 18:31]

• Forces Overview: Tyson reviews the fundamental forces: gravity, electromagnetic force, weak and strong nuclear forces. Humans can influence matter at the electromagnetic level (moving electrons), but "you ain't getting into quarks" with sound or everyday actions.
• Loudness and Wavelength: It’s not about loudness; everyday actions (including sound) move electrons but can't localize energy down to individual quarks.
  • "If you do anything at all, you are moving around electrons, and you're bringing the quarks with you..." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [17:01]
• Memorable Quote: "A whisper doesn't target anything, it just bothers everything. Equally, like the Human Resources department." — Paul Mercurio [17:37]

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3. Water Pressure and "Squeezing"

[22:07 – 27:49]

• Feeling Pressure in Water:
  • Submerging a bare arm in water feels different from wearing rubber gloves because trapped air in gloves is squeezed by water pressure. Without an air layer, water pressure equilibrates all around the body—so you don’t "feel" squeezed.
  • Analogy: Using a Ziploc bag to show how water can press out air and form a close fit demonstrates the principle.
• Limits of Water Pressure: Deeper underwater, pressure rises and can challenge human physiology (ear drums, lungs).
• Classic Tyson Deadpan: "If you have something underwater that is squeezable, the water pressure will squeeze it." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [24:33]
• Comedic Aside: "It's like the water is the mafia and your body owes the water money and it's squeezing you." — Paul Mercurio [26:25]

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4. The Roche Limit

[27:49 – 34:32]

• Definition: The Roche limit is the minimum distance at which an object held together only by gravity (like moons or rubble piles) will be pulled apart by a planet’s tidal forces.
  • "The Roche limit matters for objects that are held together by gravity. If you're just a solid object, the Roche limit is irrelevant to you." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [28:11]
• Sphere Shape as a Clue: Anything held together primarily by gravity is generally spherical.
• Tidal Forces: Tidal force depends on the inverse cube of distance, rapidly increasing as you approach a massive body.
• Roche Limit & Asteroids: Distinguishing between rubble-pile asteroids and solid ones is important for planetary defense.
• Comedy Interlude: "You're gonna need, like, 20 Ben Afflecks." — Paul Mercurio, referencing “Armageddon” asteroid movies [33:44]

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5. Most Overused Sci-Fi Movie Tropes

[34:32 – 38:29]

• Tyson’s Pick: "Explosions in space"—should be silent because space doesn’t transmit sound.
  • "You should stop hearing explosions in space. It would be completely silent because there's no air in space to propagate the sound." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [34:50]
• Paul’s Choices: The "save humanity" speech and aliens who immediately speak perfect English.
• Laser Beams: Tyson points out the visual trope of seeing beams in the vacuum of space is scientifically inaccurate—unless there’s something to reflect the light, you wouldn’t see a laser mid-stream.
  • "If you can see the laser, that means it's sending light sideways to you, right? It means there's something there reflecting the light." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [38:03]

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6. Human Connection & Cosmic Common Thread

[38:31 – 45:48]

• Paul Mercurio (on his stage show): The “common thread” connecting us all is a desire to be heard and accepted, “beautiful imperfection” that draws people together.
  • "I think it gets us out of our silos to be aware that there are other people out there different from us… you don't have to like it or understand it, but you have to know." — Paul Mercurio [41:50]
• Tyson (on curiosity): Everyone is fundamentally curious, and good educators can “fan the embers” of wonder that exist in all of us from childhood.
  • "There's nothing more satisfying… than to watch an adult have a resurfaced feeling of wonder about the world…" — Neil deGrasse Tyson [43:34]
• Concepts of Emotional and Intellectual Safety: Paul and Neil exchange insights on the importance of making environments safe for questions—emotionally (Paul) and intellectually (Neil).

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7. Expansion of the Universe and Escaping It

[49:18 – 51:31]

• Why can’t we outrun the universe? Even if you travel at the speed of light, regions of the universe are receding from us faster than light due to cosmic expansion. There’s no current way to “outrun” the expanding universe.
  • "If space is expanding faster than light… you're not outrunning the universe. That's not happening." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [50:26]
• What’s causing it? The original expansion energy plus dark energy (a mysterious negative pressure) accelerates cosmic expansion.

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8. If You Could Add a New Human Sense…

[52:11 – 55:28]

• Question: If humans could evolve one new sense to better discover the universe, what should it be?
• Tyson: Science already provides us with “senses” through instruments. But he humorously chooses “common sense” as the sense we most need.
  • "Humans lack common sense. Which means it's not common." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [54:11]
• Mercurio: Jokes that he wants the ability to sense when someone doesn't know what they’re talking about—Tyson calls this “science literacy.”

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9. Time Travel Paradoxes & Multiple Timelines

[55:28 – 58:08]

• Multiple Time Travelers: If several people could independently travel through time and each impact history, their actions would alter timelines, potentially fracturing reality into multiple universes (“splitting the timeline”).
• Consistency: You can't have conflicting events in the same universe—this leads to the "multiverse" solution in physics fiction.
  • "You can’t have a universe where Hitler rises to power, and in the same universe, Hitler doesn’t rise to power. Pick one." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [57:34]
• Memorable Analogy: “A universe with too many tabs. I like that." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [57:08]

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10. Are Black Holes "Scars in Spacetime"?

[58:19 – 61:43]

• Listener's Theory: Maybe black holes are not singularities but "topological defects" (scars or imprints) in a super-solid spacetime medium.
• Tyson Reflects: He likes the idea of space as a medium holding information but resists calling black holes “imperfections.” However, the idea of black holes emitting ripples (maybe with information) is fascinating, but needs testable predictions.
  • "Is there some scar or record within the fabric of space and time that would betray the existence of these black holes or other imperfections?" — Neil deGrasse Tyson [60:39]
• Measurement Gap: Until predictions are made that can be checked by telescopes, this remains a fun but untested idea.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On Fan Questions: "I judged how smart someone is not by how much they know, but by the depth of their curiosity." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [04:37]
• Comedic Touch: "Are you kidding? I love doing this. It's so fun." — Paul Mercurio [03:39]
• Running Gag: Paul's ongoing jokes about wearing a Speedo and being available for kids' parties and other odd jobs, especially with his own career in flux.
• Educational Philosophy: "If they forgot how to be curious, there are embers that just need to be fanned that can then reignite in their adulthood." — Neil deGrasse Tyson [43:34]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [05:06] Black holes vs. wormholes explained
• [13:04] Can a whisper affect a quark?
• [22:07] Water/glove pressure experiments
• [27:49] The Roche limit: gravity’s "sphere of destruction"
• [34:32] Most overused sci-fi movie tropes
• [38:31] The atomic common thread of humanity
• [49:18] Can you ever outrun the universe’s expansion?
• [52:11] What extra sense should humans have?
• [55:28] Multiple time travelers and the complexity of timelines
• [58:19] Black holes as "scars" or defects in spacetime

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Tone & Style

The episode balances rigorous but accessible science with dry wit and wild comedic asides. Tyson provides detailed, conceptually rich answers, while Mercurio keeps things lively, relatable, and fun—with running gags, audience empathy, and self-deprecation.

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This summary is designed to give new listeners a comprehensive sense of the episode’s content, flow, and standout moments—mixing cosmic wonder, everyday curiosity, and irreverent humor.

Transcript

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[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So, Paul, thanks for doing cosmic queries. Grab bag.

[Paul Mercurio]

I love these. Always great questions.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, some of them came from deep space, very deep.

[Paul Mercurio]

Which means they're either really smart or really drunk. I got a headache from some of the questions.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Check us out and find out what gives Paul a headache on startalk. Welcome to startalk, your place in the universe where science and pop culture collide. Startalk begins with Right now. This is Star talk cosmic queries. I got with me Paul Mercurio.

[Paul Mercurio]

What's up, my man? Good to see you again.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Welcome back.

[Paul Mercurio]

Always great to be here.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You collected the questions from our Patreon members.

[Paul Mercurio]

Always great. We got some really fun ones. Good mix.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And I never see them in advance.

[Paul Mercurio]

No, this is like, this is like Karnak where you hold the envelope and now you that now you're going to you're dating.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You're dating from 50 years ago.

[Paul Mercurio]

You know what? It's okay for viewers to not know something and then know something. That's like saying, I'm only going to teach science. That goes back 10 years. I am fed up with this. All right, go ahead. Let's continue.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I want to just take a moment to just reflect on the privilege it is to have you in this role. You're a multi Emmy winning comedy writer.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. Comedian, comedy writer. Emmys. We're talking about actual Emmys And Peabody awards.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And Peabody. That's the best one. Peabody.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. It's small, but it's large, if you know what I mean.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Thank you for taking time out of your day.

[Paul Mercurio]

Are you kidding? I love doing this. It's so fun.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Although you also work on Colbert and his days are numbered.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So taking time out of your day might not be such a task. Yeah.

[Paul Mercurio]

What are they gonna do, fire me? I'm already fired.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It might not be so stressful to take time out of your day.

[Paul Mercurio]

No. We're counting down in the coming weeks, and I am available for kids parties. I can do balloon animals pretty much. I can do a dachshund, but just the body part and no head, ears,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

or tail or legs or tails or legs or anything. And on this show, you've been knighted, Baron.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes. By yours truly. So I'm honored. I'm honored.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I did that with my Excalibur sword.

[Paul Mercurio]

You did. You cut my juggler, But I'm okay now.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So you brought questions in. And this is a grab bag.

[Paul Mercurio]

This is a grab bag.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

To be a fan favorite. Grab bags.

[Paul Mercurio]

The fans are amazing. I mean, I always say this is worth saying, like, smart, curious. You know what? It's a borderline annoying.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And by the way, I judged how smart someone is not by how much they know, but by the depth of their curiosity.

[Paul Mercurio]

The level of curiosity. Yes. And that's the only thing.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's the hungry mind in search of.

[Paul Mercurio]

And I always say, if I had you as a science teacher, I'd probably be doing something in science. Your enthusiasm and everything else. Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right.

[Paul Mercurio]

I don't care that you're taller than I am. That's annoying. Monopoly World. Hello. I'm just curious about where the differences.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Wait, who is this?

[Paul Mercurio]

It just says Monopoly World.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Monopoly World. Okay.

[Paul Mercurio]

That's all it is. You know, the person wants to be secretive about this.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Bring it on.

[Paul Mercurio]

I'm just curious about where the differences and or similarities are between wormhole and a black hole.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Oh, yeah. I mean, Just because the word hole shows up in both, Just, you know, chill out, don't overthink it.

[Paul Mercurio]

Don't be a hole about it

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

for me. One of the fun things about a black hole, cause our word hole is a two dimensional idea. Think about it. There's a hole in the ground, you fall through the hole.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right. It's stepped and it's stepped.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's a hole, it's that circle. And you fall through. Okay?

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Whereas a black hole is a hole in every direction you approach it.

[Paul Mercurio]

Which is why once you get sucked into it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. There's no path out of the black hole. Right, right. And so it's a region of space where gravity is so high that the speed of light is insufficient to escape. And just to put this in context, sometimes I make too many assumptions about what people might know. So let me back up just a little bit.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right. You know the old saying, what goes up must come down.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's bullshit.

[Paul Mercurio]

Sorry. And did you write a paper on that? I wrote a whole paper and that was a conclusion early.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

How is it that we can go to the moon if you're gonna say what goes up must come down?

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay. So it turns out there is a speed above which if you leave Earth, you'll never come back. And that is sensibly called the escape velocity.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

From Earth's surface, it's 7 miles per second. So grandma's adage works for anything anybody would have thrown, right? You throw it, it goes up. But if you have rockets, you're not beholden to grandma's attitude with some kick

[Paul Mercurio]

ass boosters and everything.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Right? Right. You're not beholden. So it will never come back, ever. It'll go to the edge of the universe before it thinks about coming back to Earth. So you can ask if it's 7 miles per second on Earth's surface. You can imagine objects, planets with higher gravity where the escape velocity is higher than 7 miles per second. Everything would weigh more. So that makes sense. Continue this line of reasoning. You get to a point where the escape velocity is the speed of light itself. The speed of light is insufficient to carry the beam out of the black hole. So you fall in, you ain't never coming out. Light's not coming out. Is there a better term for it than the black hole?

[Paul Mercurio]

The black hole. No, I think you're right. But both come from general relativity. Right. And both involve extreme mapping of space.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What's the other one? The wormhole?

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, the wormhole.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So the wormhole had some early Ideas about what that could be or what it might be. If you look at the math that gives us a black hole. The solution. There's a second solution to it, which is the mathematical opposite of a black hole, which you might call a wormhole.

[Paul Mercurio]

No, go ahead, say it again. I really wasn't paying attention.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If you were to name the mathematical opposite of a black hole, what would you call it?

[Paul Mercurio]

A white.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Thank you. A white hole. That's a solution to the equations. And it's the mathematical opposite of a black hole.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right. So a black hole sucks everything in. A white hole would probably do what?

[Paul Mercurio]

Push everything out.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Push everything out. So we said, let's look for that in the universe. Couldn't find anything that resembled anything remotely what a white hole should look like. Okay, so we don't think they exist. But how would they connect? We say, would they connect with a wormhole connecting the black hole and the white hole?

[Paul Mercurio]

But since black holes are naturally formed from collapsing matter, is there any sort of known process in the universe to, like, could naturally create some kind of a wormhole? That's.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We don't know. And we don't think so. We think you're gonna have to make one on your own time. Okay. We know how to make a wormhole. We just don't have the right ingredients. What we need is negative gravity stuff. Not the same as antimatter. Antimatter has ordinary gravity. Okay. An antiproton has the same gravity as a proton. Negative gravity stuff. Because what does gravity do? It collapses space time.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

A wormhole, you're trying to pry it open.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right. So you want the opposite and travel through it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, that's. That's. That's. You do that for free. Once it opens the hole, you just step through that doesn't quite.

[Paul Mercurio]

Just open the hole and you get sucked through.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

There's no sucking. You just step through if you can pry it open.

[Paul Mercurio]

But if a black hole is millions and billions of miles away from another. Locate. Isn't a wormhole connect? That's a tunnel, in a way.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Connected by a wormhole. Watch where you're stepping when you go through the other side because you don't know where. Get one of those mirrors. Do you need one of those. Look under the car mirrors. Do that through this.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh, I know that. I'm Italian. I know that.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Stop. Stop.

[Paul Mercurio]

Do you need easy pass in a wormhole? And what do they charge?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I bet some municipality will put one up in the first wormhole.

[Paul Mercurio]

But you can naturally create a stable wor or no.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Aliens, for example, if they have access to materials that we don't, and they discover a negative gravity thing, then they, if they're smart, will know how to configure it. To pry open a hole through the fabric of space and time. You step through and you land in another place and another time.

[Paul Mercurio]

So it's sort of like wormhole versus black hole. It's like black hole. You check into a hotel, you ain't checking out.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's what they call the roach motel. So check in, you don't check out.

[Paul Mercurio]

Wormhole, you're checking out of the hotel, but you end up in a worse hotel with a lousy buffet breakfast.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Speaking of checking in and out, I think a lot about wormholes. And you know, the closest we have to wormholes in our civilization is an elevator. There's like whatever's out here, you walk into this room, it's a box. It's a little box. Someone pushes some buttons and then the doors open and it's a whole other place, right?

[Paul Mercurio]

But what people don't explain and science will never. Is why I have to make small talk during that wormhole travel where I wanna kill myself.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

The universe brims with mystery, so I think of that all the time. Plus, if you're coming from an elevator that opens to the outdoors and you come in and then you're not outdoors anymore, you're in some other place. And if I don't tell you where you are, you have no idea. If I bring an alien into an elevator, it'll have no clue what I

[Paul Mercurio]

just did with it because it went through time and it doesn't know.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It doesn't know what I just did with it.

[Paul Mercurio]

Because it's a spatial recognition.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

As far as it's concerned, it'll be

[Paul Mercurio]

a wormhole just to finish up and we'll move on. The stuff that you refer to, we

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

don't know what it could be or what it is or even if it exists.

[Paul Mercurio]

Are we close to sun?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, nothing close. Negative gravity. Come on now. If we had that, we wouldn't need rockets.

[Paul Mercurio]

Do you think we'll ever get there?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Nothing in the universe looks like it's operating under negative gravity.

[Paul Mercurio]

But I know the way science operates. Keep your mind open to every and any all possibilities.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It is, and we're looking in the universe. We don't see any open is. Oh, we can't explain that. I wonder if it's negative gravity. That would be a way to think about negative. There's nothing out there that needs negative gravity to account for It. So I'm skeptical, but it's nonetheless fun to think about.

[Paul Mercurio]

It is.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And maybe in the end we just need magic like Dr. Strange. Okay. But I kind of want to solve it with Rick of Rick and Morty because he uses real science.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's sort of. Yeah, we've talked about that.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's completely real science.

[Paul Mercurio]

In Rick and Morty wormhole. It's theoretically possible, but science is like, we're on our coffee break. Don't ask us to do it. Natasha shaw Davis. Hello, Dr. Tyson. This is Natasha from New Mexico. I'm currently at band club with other medical students and our mics are broken.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So with you at A.

[Paul Mercurio]

Where she's at band club.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Band club.

[Paul Mercurio]

B A, N D. That's a thing. She plays it. Yes. There's a club. They play in a band.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And people admit to this? Yes, I'm at band club.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes. She was writing this while she was getting beaten up.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Well, they can't beat him up too much because then they can't perform for the. For the game.

[Paul Mercurio]

Not the fingers. Not the fingers. No. This is literally hilarious to me because she's writing this as she's at band club and she's a medical student. So apparently you have time in medical school to be in a band, which is troubling to me. I am not coming to you, Ms. Davis, for any medical treatment because I don't want you to play your flute while you're working on me. Okay. So I'm currently a band club with other medical students. Our mics are broken. So while other instruments are cool, I must yell. How quietly should a singer whisper to affect one quark at a time? What about just one atom? Any good uses of my nonsense? Thank you both. I like this question. Okay, so, I mean, it's not about Whispering Cloud.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Here it is. You can divide the universe up into four forces. So the obvious one is gravity. We all know about that. Another one is the electromagnetic force. That's what holds all our model atoms and molecules together.

[Paul Mercurio]

The third is Paul Mercurial charisma.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's a force. No, no, that's. I checked. In fact, I double checked. It's not there.

[Paul Mercurio]

That's negative gravity.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Then there's the weak nuclear force, which operates within particles. That describes how they decay into other particles. And then there's the strong nuclear force in the nucleus of an atom. We don't have access to the strong nuclear force. You gotta be like 10 million degrees to get in there.

[Paul Mercurio]

But we have quarks that make up atoms. Hang on Hang on, hang on.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We don't have access to that. The weak nuclear force. We're not really messing with that either. We can interact with gravity, and we interact with the electromagnetic force. All right, Whatever you do, that's what you're doing. Okay? Now, we had someone in that chair

[Paul Mercurio]

take a hit of acid before you came here. What am I supposed to do with that? Whatever you do, that's what you're doing.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We had someone in this chair, Betul Kachar, who said something I'd never heard before. I had to pause and reflect on it and say, wow, that's deep. The world is simply electrons looking for a place to rest.

[Advertisement Voice]

Wow.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And I didn't want to embrace that until I kept thinking about it, and it's like, yeah, that's what's going on at all times. That's what happens in. And when atoms get together with atoms to make molecules, the electrons are finding a place to hang out.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay, I have this pen. This is a solid.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It is held together by molecules and the electrons that bind, enabling it.

[Paul Mercurio]

First of all, did you wash your hands before you touched that?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I licked my hands. Okay.

[Paul Mercurio]

But no, you're saying electrons are in motion within that at all times.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

At all times in everything. So there's the electrons. That's the electromagnetic force. But she's talking about quarks. You ain't getting into quarks. Quarks are. They're locked up inside, right?

[Paul Mercurio]

So it's like Legos make up a brick building. Within the Lego, you've got atoms, and you've got within the atoms.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You're not getting into the quartz without higher power than what we have access to. But she wants to still influence it. And it's kind of a metaphysical question. Whatever you do, ever at all. You're invoking electromagnetic fields and forces.

[Paul Mercurio]

But the issue here is wavelength, and it's not about loudness. It's about the fact that the collective wavelengths.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I don't care if she.

[Paul Mercurio]

Are too large to localize into a quartz.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

She breathes. That's true. That was good.

[Paul Mercurio]

Come on. Huh?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That was good.

[Paul Mercurio]

I have Peabody awards.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

The point is, she wants to whisper at some volume level that will somehow tickle quarks. The fact that she.

[Paul Mercurio]

Which, by the way, is a fun

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

parlor game, tickling quarks. If you do anything at all, you are moving around electrons, and you're bringing the quarks with you in the nuclei of the atoms that are parts of the molecules that comprise you. So you cannot do anything without setting into motion electrons and quarks either bound into the molecules that move, because as she whispers, vibrations go into the air and the molecules of the air vibrate, carrying it to another location.

[Paul Mercurio]

So a whisper doesn't target anything, it just bothers everything. Equally like the Human Resources department. Right?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I mean, they're there for your own protection.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes, that's true.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We have to worry about this in science all the time. If the mics are down and everyone is screaming at each other and she wants to be heard, the background level of conversation creates what we call a noise level. Okay. That's the random sounds that are out there. If she wants to be noticed, she has to break through that noise either in frequency or intensity in order to get noticed by anybody else.

[Paul Mercurio]

You define intensity as loudness, and frequency

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

is if she comes at it with a frequency that no one else is communicating with, everybody will hear it.

[Paul Mercurio]

That's right. So you have a deep voice. If everybody's higher, your voice is gonna cut through.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

My voice is gonna cut through. And if I come in in a high pitch voice, that'll get heard in the din of other noises.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, but at the atomic scale, does sound stop being a precise tool and become like more of like a shove, Like a statistical shove of some kind?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, it's always just. It's a pressure wave moving through the medium at all times. Yeah. Are we alone in the universe or just early to the party? In my latest book, Take Me to your Leader, I explore how aliens might find us, what they be like, and what we should do next. Curious. You should be. Take Me to youo Leader is available now in print and in audiobook, which I narrated. Don't wait until after you've had your first alien encounter to grab a copy of Take Me to youo Leader because then it would be too late.

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[Paul Mercurio]

Mikhail Boisvert hello Guardians of the Geeks.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Nice.

[Paul Mercurio]

Mikhail from Canada all right. If I submerge my arm in a sink full of water, first of all, you need to get a hobby or get in a swimming pool.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Damn you cold blooded.

[Paul Mercurio]

Come on man.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

People coming in out of their honest home experiments and you're gonna talk smack about em?

[Paul Mercurio]

Screw you and the cork you didn't ride in on. If I submerge my arm in a sink full of water or get in a swimming pool, I don't really feel squeezed by the water. However, if I do the same with rubber gloves, say on washing dishes or get in a river wearing a waterproof fishing wader and I hope you're fishing and it's not some weird thing, I feel disturbingly squeezed. What's up with that? Shouldn't I feel less having something rigid in terms of material around me?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If he put on mittens and then submerged, it's not gonna he's putting on latex gloves, of course he's gonna squeeze it.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay? That's what I mean. The guy needs a hobby.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If you're Putting on rubber gloves, they're gonna squeeze your hand.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, well, because it doesn't feel like it's squeezing you. It's just pushing your body.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No. So here's the thing.

[Paul Mercurio]

Water, air pressure is created between the.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Right now you're in equilibrium with the air pressure. You know how I know that? Cause you're not shrinking, you're not expanding.

[Paul Mercurio]

Thank you.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So all pressure is equal on all parts of your body. I know that right now. Okay, Here's a cool thing you can do if you're sitting in a pool. We're approaching summer now. Just sit at the edge of the pool up to your neck. Like, sit on a step where you're up to your neck. Then inhale a very deep breath, and your body comes up a little in the water.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh, I was a swimmer growing up.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because you're getting less dense.

[Paul Mercurio]

Why does my bathing suit get air in it and it just fills up?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because you're farting. No one told you that.

[Paul Mercurio]

These are practical questions. I've been a swimmer my whole life.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because you were speedos. And there's no air exchange. And it becomes a. I don't do waiters, man.

[Paul Mercurio]

I just do a speedo. Everybody take that in at home. Drink that in. But the glove traps air. And when the air gets squeezed, the glove tightens.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay? So.

[Paul Mercurio]

And that's what he's feeling.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If you have something underwater that is squeezable, the water pressure will squeeze it. If you have a plastic bag and put anything in it. Okay.

[Paul Mercurio]

A head doesn't matter.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It won't matter what you put in it.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's what the word anything means. The air inside the bag is in equal pressure with the air in the atmosphere. So the bag is just the bag. We don't even think about it.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If you take that bag and immerse it without letting water get in.

[Paul Mercurio]

So you seal the bag.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, don't seal it. Don't. You leave it open up top.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And lower it into the water before

[Paul Mercurio]

the point where the to stop. Where the water doesn't.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Correct.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That bag will collapse completely around what you put in it.

[Paul Mercurio]

That's air pressure.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It is water pressure winning out over air pressure.

[Paul Mercurio]

Air pressure between the heads.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And it's gonna take all. Between all the heads that are in the duffel bag. It will. It will squeeze out all of the air that's in that bag. Then you zip it, and now you have basically a vacuum sealed bag.

[Paul Mercurio]

So, like, water itself is chill. There's no pressure. But you put a glove no, no,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I didn't say that. I'm working my way to that. I'm just saying that if you have a glove, typically there's air between your hand and the glove. If you put your hand in the water, the water's gonna press the air out and it'll feel like the glove is squeezing on your hand.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

But it's not. It's just taking the air out.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay, so now watch. If you go deeper, then water pressure becomes significant, and there's a point where your body cannot resist the water pressure and your eardrums will pop, your lungs will collapse, and if you go deep enough, you just implode.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's like the water is the mafia and your body owes the water money and it's squeezing you.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Is that the exact analogy to what I have to.

[Paul Mercurio]

I think that works. You said earlier in Italian, I am. I'm talking from experience, and we were

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

talking about heads in a duffel bag.

[Paul Mercurio]

I know a guy who knows a guy, and I owe somebody money.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So it's fun to watch this happen. Just take a bag like a Ziploc bag, but leave it unzipped and just dip it into the water. Just watch all the air come out. It'll be snug onto what's in there. Then zip it up.

[Paul Mercurio]

I get a Ziploc.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So how to get all the air out of it?

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, I get a Ziploc sandwich bag, I put something in it, and if I squeeze the air out, what it does is it forms. The bag forms pretty closely around that object. Correct.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You can get water to do that for you for free, but you have to set it up to make that happen.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. So that's water pressure getting the air out. But five inches into the water, that's not enough water pressure for you to feel that as the pressure on your body. Here's what'll happen. As you submerge, there's pressure on you. You have skin, Right. So skin is pretty good. But your eardrums, they are sensitive to pressure. Your capacity to breathe against pressure

[Paul Mercurio]

will

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

be challenged as you're still fighting pressure, as you're fighting it, as you get lower and lower.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So it's faster. Pressure is a fun. Not fun. It's a fascinating feature.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's a little unsettling, but I'll keep it in mind. Lee Robertson. Greetings, gentlefolk of the universe. Lee from Florida here. What is the determination for an object to be affected by the Roche limit? I know Saturn's rings were likely made by one of its Former moons being destroyed by the planet's Roche limit. But how are we able to maintain orbit around Earth with our own Roche limit?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

The Roche limit matters for objects that are held together by the force of gravity. If you're just a solid object, the Roche limit is irrelevant to you. Okay? You're a solid object. You are not held together by the forces of gravity.

[Paul Mercurio]

Wait, if I push the bounds of the Roche limit, are I going to be able to.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You can just walk across the Roche limit and laugh in the face of

[Paul Mercurio]

crap, which I've wanted to do for a long time.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Of objects that are gravitationally bound, you could just laugh as you walk by them.

[Paul Mercurio]

So why the distinction on solid objects versus non solid?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I'm going to tell you. So let's distinguish solid objects that are rigid and solid objects that are held together by gravity. We think of Earth as a solid object, but it's held together by gravity. All right. How do you know if something's held together by gravity? It's spherical.

[Paul Mercurio]

Always?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yes. Pretty much, yes.

[Paul Mercurio]

Why does it have to be spherical?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because that's what gravity does to something when it is in charge.

[Paul Mercurio]

I'm gonna go back to this pen cap. Isn't this held together by gravity?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, it's held together by electromagnetic forces which swamp the effects of gravity. That's why that's not falling apart. Even though we're within the Roche limit of Earth, you can walk around and not get torn apart. Because crossing the Roche limit, Earth, is not really tearing you apart. It feels like it looks like that's what's happening, but that's not what's happening. I'm gonna tell you what's happening. You ready?

[Paul Mercurio]

Yep.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay. The closer you get to an object, the stronger its tidal forces are. And tidal forces go up as the inverse cube of your distance. If you are one third the distance to an object that you used to be, what's the inverse of 1/3? 3.3Cube it. What do you get? 3 times 3 times 3, what do you get?

[Paul Mercurio]

27.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

27. The tidal forces are 27 times higher if you're one third the distance than they used to be. If you're one fifth the distance, it's 125 times higher. So these are tidal forces. All that means is it's pulling on one side, the side closest to the planet, way more than it is on the other side. So at the Roche limit, the tidal force simply exceeds the gravity.

[Paul Mercurio]

And what is that point? How do we measure that point?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So we should calculate where that is. If it Exceeds the gravity.

[Paul Mercurio]

But it's different for every object.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If it exceeds the gravity of the object that's holding it together, then gravity loses. The tidal forces win. And so mountains just float up because they're not held down by gravity anymore. Rocks float up and the whole thing just breaks apart. It doesn't break. It just lifts apart from itself.

[Paul Mercurio]

Cause the Roche limit is kicking the ass.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It assembles is the better term than break apart.

[Paul Mercurio]

I like kicking the ass because nothing breaks.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

A rock is still gonna be a rock. But if the rock was sitting on earth, it's no longer attached to Earth. Cause a rock is held together not by gravity, but by electromagnetic forces. And you have this fetish about your pen. So your pen would survive a crossing of the road slope intact.

[Paul Mercurio]

I love you. I love you fetish is a little strong. I mean, really. So is it sort of like pulling bread apart, and at some point, you're pulling it apart to the point where it becomes disconnected from itself, and then that's the Roche limit.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

At that point, if the stretchy part of the bread is what we're thinking of as gravity, then there's a point where your force exceeds the gravity and the bread just pulls apart.

[Paul Mercurio]

So like, the Roche limit is like the ultimate relationship. Like where you're getting closer and closer. It doesn't mean anything because you just want to turn your relationship into confetti.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Well, up until that point, you're both independent, strong entities within the Roche lobe. You get torn apart. No, you get. No, I used a different word. You get disassembled. Everything you once were is now in pieces.

[Paul Mercurio]

So it's like you're in a bar, you, Things start to happen. There's a guy, you get a little close. Roche limit's like, let's take it outside. I'm gonna dismember you.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Only if you're talking to his woman does that happen.

[Paul Mercurio]

Exactly.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It doesn't just happen.

[Paul Mercurio]

No. I'm in my Speedo in the bar. She's checking me out. I'm not asking for trouble. And the Roche limit kicks in and we have to go outside. So the Roche limit sort of exceeds gravity's power or strength and then.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Exactly. And so it's a very natural place where that would happen. But anything that's held together electromagnetically, gravity is intact. Rocks, boulders, no problem. Your pan cap you. And the electromagnetic force is 40 orders of magnitude. 40 powers of 10. Stronger than gravity.

[Paul Mercurio]

Therefore, Roche limit has no effect on

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

something that's held together by electromagnetic forces like rocks. But if you are A rubble pile that's all held together by gravity. And you come near the Roche lobe, it'll totally disassemble the rocks themselves within,

[Paul Mercurio]

the rubble will stay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Will stay.

[Paul Mercurio]

But they'll break apart. So when we have two rocks here, they're together.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We don't know whether some asteroids are just rubble piles or whether they're solid. Which matters if we're gonna deflect them en route to hitting us.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Cause you're gonna push it out of the way.

[Paul Mercurio]

You're gonna need like 20 Ben Afflecks.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What's that? Ben Affleck.

[Paul Mercurio]

He was part of that.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Was he?

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, he goes on the thing with.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

But he's. It was Bruce Willis.

[Paul Mercurio]

Bruce Willis.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It was Bruce Willis.

[Paul Mercurio]

Bruce Willis is the old salty guy. And then Ben is like loose. But then Ben ends up being the guy.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And then Liv Tyler, she helped out too.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh my God.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You need something to come back to.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes, exactly.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I don't know if you know, but we recently did an explainer on the Roche limit.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh, perfect.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So anyone who was confused by what I just said or by what you said.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, the reason this question got asked after your explainer is. The buzz on social media is your explainer was. Eh, it was Roche limit bad.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So you just catch it in our archives. Okay. I think we do well on our explainers.

[Paul Mercurio]

You do well on everything. Are you kidding? When you care, Bev. Happy galactic gumbo to you, Dr. Tyson. If you. If you could delete one overused sci Fi movie trope, what would it be? Thank you for keeping the educational eternal flame strong, Bev. A one syllable name from Alabama.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I've given up on this, so I'm gonna mention it, but not that I think it'll ever happen. You should stop hearing explosions in space. It would be completely silent because there's no air in space to propagate the sound.

[Paul Mercurio]

The sound.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

The waves from wherever it is to where you are completely silent. So it makes for much less drama if they're just.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay, that's all good and technical. Can I have one now?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. What's yours?

[Paul Mercurio]

Can we delete the speech where they save humanity? Have you met humanity? It's annoying. We don't need to save it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Or how about the one where the astronaut is like, are they lost in space? Or they're gonna save somebody? Or not save somebody. And there's always the video of the kid that was just born and they're touching the video screen back on Earth, you know? Really? Come on. Can we move on from that, please? You Know. Exactly. And anybody who has like a nine month old kid, keep him on Earth. Yeah, you don't send him into space.

[Paul Mercurio]

No, he doesn't need to be on a video at 9. He's gonna be doing that the rest of his life. How about the fact that when they show up, the aliens, they immediately speak perfect English. Okay. Meanwhile, you can't understand the guy from Glasgow, Scotland, right now. All right? And suddenly. Right. No, seriously, like you got an octopus alien Studied.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, the aliens studied.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, no, it doesn't wash for me.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

They're smart. They can learn. They're smart.

[Paul Mercurio]

Why are we always assuming that we're dumb and they're smart?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because they.

[Paul Mercurio]

That's another trope.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because they arrived here.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, but.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And we cheer on people who ascend 100 km above Earth's surface, which is the equivalent of two dimes above a schoolroom globe. They go up and come back and we celebrate them as astronauts. We have an alien coming from across the galaxy?

[Paul Mercurio]

How do you know? They just. It took them a long time to figure it out. Why do we give them credit?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I'm just saying, they come across the galaxy, I'm thinking they're smarter than us. I'm thinking they have higher technology. I'm thinking they could read a dictionary and be fluent right after they read it.

[Paul Mercurio]

But they could read the dictionary and just say, this is a really stupid race and it's not worth it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

They could do that too. In fact, they likely will.

[Paul Mercurio]

Exactly. So those are your tropes. You have any others that come to mind?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So those with the touching the screen of the newborn infant from your spouse at home.

[Paul Mercurio]

What about some space. Astronauts are floating in space.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's fine. That's fine. That's fine.

[Paul Mercurio]

But then they're remote. But go ahead. You have.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So there's another one. They have these sort of laser weapons. Okay.

[Paul Mercurio]

And again, they're making noise. Choom, choom, choom.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, that's why I said I've given up. I let them make the choom choom choom noise. So you see doom up my noise. And you see the laser going from the ship to the target. No, the laser's headed to the target. If you can see the laser, that means it's sending light sideways to you, right? It means there's something there reflecting the light. It would be like the kid went like this with the chalkboard erasers. Okay, now do the lasers so we can see the laser beam. That's not how it takes place.

[Paul Mercurio]

The laser beam has an endpoint that it Hits the object.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. You'll see it explode on the other

[Paul Mercurio]

side, but you're not seeing the beam.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You won't see the beam at all.

[Paul Mercurio]

Because it's light.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's light. And unless you can reflect it out of the beam to your eyes, how

[Paul Mercurio]

do you know that there's not something happening in space, in time, that is doing that? You don't understand.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You have to be in the middle of a big gas cloud to make that happen. And then you'd have particles reflecting.

[Paul Mercurio]

Because that's sort of the chalk in the thing.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, that's the equivalent of the chalk.

[Advertisement Voice]

All right.

[Paul Mercurio]

I don't think we need to save humanity. That's all I know. Kurt guy. Hey, Neil and Paul. Paul, on your show. Permission to speak. You spent years pulling the extraordinary out of ordinary people from a cosmic perspective. Neil always says we're all made of stardust. After hearing so many different life stories, what's the atomic common thread you found that proves we're all part of the same human constellation.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I love that. And so that reminds me that your stage show is not just you on stage. A fundamental part is you interacting with the audience.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. Just born out of my standup and liking to talk to audiences and getting these amazing stories.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So people caught on and now they leave the front rows empty.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's like. Yeah, it's like going to a Gallagher show where you smash a few fruit.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yallagher. For those who are over 50.

[Paul Mercurio]

My job is to slam open people up. You act like you're young. You're 78.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You have a blood gym.

[Paul Mercurio]

You have a prostate. I know. I talked to your doctor.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Beat my prostate out of this. So what you do only works if. Cause you never met these people before.

[Paul Mercurio]

No.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You can.

[Paul Mercurio]

Although I do get asked if it's preplanned, if they've been scripted.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I get you. I know you're talented. You don't need that. I get that. So. So you read the audience by whatever metrics and you know what thread will work through them so that you have a meaningful exchange of content and humor.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And so is this because you know human nature so well? Cause I have my counterpart to that, just as an educator. But I want to hear. Because the comedian is way closer than the educator is.

[Paul Mercurio]

I think that people want to be heard. And I think people want to be heard in a context where they feel safe. I define safe as, like, not worrying about political corruption in what you had to say. And also that they're not gonna be made fun of.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That would mean Emotionally safe, not physically safe.

[Paul Mercurio]

And then although we do this over an alligator pit, so there's a physical safety issue.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And lava, too. You need the lava.

[Paul Mercurio]

Of course. Hello. For me, what I've been told, and I can't speak to this, I do have this natural curiosity. I'm not just asking the questions as part of an act, so. And when you get to that second, third, and fourth question, you get these amazing stories. And I think the reason that it works is because there's something that I call we all have beautiful imperfection. And what I say in my show is, I like that we're imperfect, and we should embrace that. You know? In other words, we wanna think that life comes in nice, neat boxes and everything's black and white, but life would be boring. But in the imperfection, that's what's interesting. That's where you get crazy stories, funny stories, hellfire stories, because we're all making imperfect decisions all the time. But that's okay. And I think what happens is. And a connection happens with people in the audience that night because they're sitting there going, consciously or subconsciously, oh, this guy's as imperfect as I am. And I feel pretty good about that.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Maybe we should redefine those imperfections as perfections if they're fundamental to what it is to be alive.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh, wow. That's a lot deeper than I thought of it. But.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And so, no, see, it's in the same vein of. That is if everyone is special, then no one is special.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's the same kind of.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If everyone has imperfections, then that's what the perfection is. Right.

[Paul Mercurio]

But Kurt asked about Common Thread, and I think the common thread is that people wanna be connected. Especially now, things are divisive and they seem to only be getting worse. But it's not a political show. But I think people wanna be connected, and they get connected through these stories. And I think the other thing that happens is I think it gets us out of our silos to be aware that there are other people out there different from us in a way that's good to know. You don't have with it, like it or understand it, but you have to

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

know in advance that they're gonna like that they're not gonna get up and walk out of the show.

[Paul Mercurio]

They do.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay.

[Paul Mercurio]

I mean, I've had stories where you're like, oh, my God. I mean, I've had two heroin addicts on stage, one recovering and one didn't wanna recover.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You bring them up on stage.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh, yeah. They come on Stage.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay.

[Paul Mercurio]

I bring them up in groups, four, six people at a time, and then we just start.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's brave. I've seen you do that at the beginning of Colbert. Yeah, yeah.

[Paul Mercurio]

And then what ends up happening?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You're warming up the audience.

[Paul Mercurio]

What ends up happening is it really turns into, like, we're hanging out in somebody's big basement, having drinks and telling stories for people who have never met before. Because then people from the audience will start to yell out questions, which is fine with me. And then the beautiful thing for me is they don't leave right after the show's over. They come over to somebody and they'll say, oh, you're from Portland. I'm from Portland. And they'll start to connect because they

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

learned that about them. Yeah, yeah.

[Paul Mercurio]

And they were drawn in by the conversation. So I think it's the common thread of sort of. Of we're all imperfect and we're all figuring it out.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So we need to send you to the Middle East.

[Paul Mercurio]

Whoa.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Bring peace to the world.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh, yes. Okay. I'm the one. You know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna go in my Speedo. That'll make people throw up.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Stop all action.

[Paul Mercurio]

Exactly. Nobody can fight because they're all throwing up. But thank you for asking that question. It gives me a chance to explain the show a little bit. Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's pretty awesome.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So my version of that. I don't know if I got asked it as well.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. I think it's true. Both.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. I rely on an assumption that everyone is fundamentally curious at some level, and if they forgot how to be curious, there are embers that just need to be fanned that can then reignite in their adulthood. Embers that were there as children. And there's nothing more satisfying to an educator than to watch an adult have a resurfaced feeling of wonder about the world that kids have every day, because every day in a kid's life is new.

[Paul Mercurio]

So here's what you do. We talked about emotional safety in my show. What you do is what I'll call intellectual safety. Like, I never feel stupid, and I don't think anything really.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I've been trying to make you feel stupid. I've been failing at that. Let me go back and try again.

[Paul Mercurio]

You really stupid. No. You give intellectual safety and Susie. And those two things together. You can draw people in emotionally with enthusiasm and not being pedantic and talking down to them. And rather, you never make somebody feel

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

they don't fear displaying their ignorance.

[Paul Mercurio]

Exactly.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. Okay.

[Paul Mercurio]

And so when. Look, I mean, we all.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

But I will attack you. I will attack you if you don't know that you're ignorant and are coming out of the gate strong.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right? Exactly.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Cause then you're in this place where, listen, you know enough to think you're right and you don't know enough to know you're wrong. And then you're aggressive.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. Everybody watching, everybody listening. And you and I have had a moment where you go, I don't want to ask that question. I'm gonna feel it's stupid.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You and me, not you and I.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay. You see, this is why people don't socialize with you. This is why you're alone a lot, sitting there, pulling bread apart, doing the Roche limit thing.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I'm just saying.

[Paul Mercurio]

So I think that that's a common thing, especially when you're younger. It's like, I want to ask this question and I feel stupid to ask it. Then you ask it and the person goes, it's great you asked that because five other people had the same question. You never create an environment where you feel like you could ask a stupid question and you have enthusiasm. So you give what I'll call intellectual safety in that way.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Thank you for thinking about it that way.

[Paul Mercurio]

And I think it's really important.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay, good.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

With our mutual appreciation society.

[Paul Mercurio]

This is great. I'm still not hanging out with you

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

after this Time for a couple more questions. Sure.

[Paul Mercurio]

Absolutely.

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[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What would you do if your online

[Paul Mercurio]

store converted 36% more shoppers?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You could take 36% more vacation.

[Paul Mercurio]

Another pina colada. Yes, please. Open a new retail location with 36% more square feet. Fantastic. Hire 36% more help. You're hired.

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[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Shopify has the world's best converting checkout

[Paul Mercurio]

up to 36% better than other e commerce platforms.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What you do with those extra sales

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[Paul Mercurio]

Switch to Shopify [e-mail] setup and get a $1 trial.

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[Sponsor Voice]

I'm Alikon Hemraj and I

[Paul Mercurio]

support startalk on Patreon. This is startalk with Neil DeGrasse Tyson. Hi, Dr. Tyson. If space itself is expanding faster than life, what's really stopping us from ever outrunning the universe? And is the limit physics or just our current understanding of it? Alan, Ray, are here. An Indian turning in from Vilnius, Lithuania.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Whoa. Okay, so if I understand that question. If space is expanding and the fastest you can travel in the space is the speed of light. And space is expanding faster than the

[Paul Mercurio]

speed of light, which is 7 miles per.7.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, that's the escape velocity.

[Paul Mercurio]

For the escape velocity, go ahead.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay. Yeah. The speed of light is 186,282 miles per second. If the Space is expanding faster than light. And within space, the fastest you can move is the speed of light. You're not outrunning the universe.

[Paul Mercurio]

Is it ever possible?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, you're not outrunning the universe. That's not happening.

[Paul Mercurio]

And is it. Do we know that, or do we just think that there's science out there that we don't understand?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We're not outrunning the universe. If the universe reconstructs, collapsed, and is not then stretching at faster than the speed of light, then, yeah, you can get wherever you want. Every place you see, you can get there at the speed of light or less. But right now, we live in a universe where there's a distance at which it's receding from us faster than the speed of light. And it's not a problem because that's Einstein's general theory of relativity, which places no speed limits.

[Paul Mercurio]

What is causing it to recede faster than the speed of light? Do we know?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Two things. The original energy of expansion was greater than the escape velocity of the universe itself. That's another way to think about that. That will expand forever. But we also found dark energy, which is this negative pressure that's forcing the expansion to accelerate. And so that puts it out of reach.

[Paul Mercurio]

Negative pressure? I thought you were talking about your personality. Okay, all right, we're gonna do another one.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So you're not outrunning the universe, so just chill out on that one.

[Paul Mercurio]

We want to get a couple more in here as we finish. Diego Calderon. Hello, Dr. Tyson. I'm Diego Calderon from the world's longest and narrowest country, home to some of the world's most advanced telescopes. I'm a new Patreon member and someone deeply curious about the universe. Our telescopes can detect parts of reality. We are completely blind to radio waves, infrared, X rays, and gamma rays, but they always translate them into forms our senses can understand. If humans could develop one extra sense to better discover the universe, what sense would you choose? Greetings from. Where is he?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Chile.

[Paul Mercurio]

There you go, Santana.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And if he's Chilean, then it's not Calderon. It's Calderon. Diego Calderon.

[Paul Mercurio]

I feel like you're hitting on me right now. We got a tango.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

The Andes mountain range goes practically the full length of Chile. And so all the great telescopes in South America landed in Chile for that reason. There's also very good atmospheric stability because the mountains are right on the ocean shore. And so the way the air comes in and interacts with the mountain range, it creates for a very stable observing environment.

[Paul Mercurio]

The mountain range is so tall, it's

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

halt relative to that. And. And the air is cool off the ocean. So it all combines the same advantages they get in Hawaii in the big observatories.

[Paul Mercurio]

We should go on a vacation there together. To the Andes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You and me.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. You know, bring the wives. I don't know if they're gonna wanna come.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Leave your Speedo.

[Paul Mercurio]

So, yeah, if humans could develop one

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

exercise, you know what it'd be?

[Paul Mercurio]

Better discover what we.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, I know what it'd be. You ready? Common sense.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes. Come here. Give me that. Right there. Mine was know what you're talking about.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No. Common sense we don't need. I mean, I feel a little privileged here as a scientist because scientists have dozens of senses, just like Diego commented. We can see infrared, ultraviolet, X rays, gamma rays, radio waves without our physiology enabling that because we have detectors. That's what science is. It's how to probe the world beyond the capacity of our physiology to accomplish that. So because I can do it with my tools. I'm not thinking that I'm deficient.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's not.

[Paul Mercurio]

But he's talking about not through tools, but just a natural.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I know. I'm just saying I don't feel the deficiency that he's asking because I have science.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And if there's. I think common sense is something. Humans lack common sense. Which means it's not common.

[Paul Mercurio]

I just pick the ability to detect, you know, when someone actually knows what they're talking about or is just a bag of hot air. How about that sense?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's science literacy, which empowers you to know when someone else is focused on.

[Paul Mercurio]

I don't need a sense of dark matter. I need a sense that tells me where the hell my phone is so I don't tear my house apart like I'm a rabid dinosaur looking for some meat. I don't know. I'm getting angry now. I don't make sense when I get angry.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So you lose your phone in your own home. Yes. You haven't done that since anybody over?

[Paul Mercurio]

No. Here we go. Here we go. So common sense is actually a good one.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. Because I'm content with the senses that my methods and tools of science. But this gets back to otherwise bring to me.

[Paul Mercurio]

This is what we get back to what we were talking about before when we talked about intellectual safety. It's sort of the person you don't like and I agree is the one that will just come in, you know, pulling a china shop like I know everything and doesn't want to hear anything.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And I don't mind someone doing that if they actually knew everything. But generally, when you do know everything, you're not that aggressive.

[Paul Mercurio]

No, exactly.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. Because you're comfortable.

[Paul Mercurio]

You're not overcompensating.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You don't overcompensate.

[Paul Mercurio]

That's the way you do. I mean. Wait, what? Well, that was a great question. Yeah, really good, I think.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Couple more. Time for a couple more. Slip another one in.

[Paul Mercurio]

Here we go. Hello, Dr. Tyson. In popular fiction, we experience time travel from one perspective. Either a single person traveling through time or multiple people traveling to a specific time in a single event. We rarely, if ever hear of multiple people traveling from multiple perspectives. How would the universe handle these separate events? Thanks. From Austintown, Ohio, Bob W. The universe

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

can't handle the truth? I don't know.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, it's conflicting cause and effect.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If one person goes to one place, and that's what the story. Fine. But you can make another story about somebody going somewhere else and let there be a hundred stories about people going throughout. So maybe the question is, if someone is about to disrupt a timeline of events, it gets highly complicated if somebody else is in a different part of that timeline with similar capacity to influence the timeline of events, and then it gets very chaotic.

[Paul Mercurio]

But wait. The universe would have to either force all of those perspectives into one consistent story, split them into separate realities, or prevent the situation entirely.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It would just become one story. It wouldn't have to force anything.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay, so then, if time travel were possible, would multiple travelers from different points in time necessarily converge into contradictions?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

They would wreak havoc on the timeline we have come to know and love. They would turn it into a new timeline that had them as part of that timeline to begin with.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, but that's not science fiction. That's like the universe opening up too many tabs and everything crashing.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

A universe with too many tabs. I like that. Yeah, that's a perfect analogy, because I

[Paul Mercurio]

did my thesis in Chile over that. It's so weird. When were you there? It seems contradictory to me.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, I'm just. I think the issue is how much of a maelstrom would unfold if more than one person were meddling in the timeline simultaneously.

[Paul Mercurio]

Can multiple conflicting paths be all true at the same time, or. No.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Not in the same universe. No.

[Paul Mercurio]

Okay, but they can be through time tables.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What does conflict mean? Right, so you can't have a universe where Hitler rises to power, and in the same universe, Hitler doesn't rise to power. Pick one. And so this is why people are thinking that timeline splits. You actually Split universes. This allows them to.

[Paul Mercurio]

So contradictory things can exist in two different universes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's the only way to get out of that conundrum. That conundrum.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right, Got it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And there are plenty of people who want to think that way about universes. The timeline splits into two universes.

[Paul Mercurio]

I would time travel with you.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You would?

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. Okay, if you didn't talk.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

As long as you leave your speedos behind, we can go anywhere.

[Paul Mercurio]

Ah, there you go. I think we did a nice job here. We got a lot of questions.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, one quick one and I'll answer.

[Paul Mercurio]

Quick, go a quick one. Okay, let me find a quick quick. Patrick here. Dr. Tyson Patrick, just another science nerd from Southeast Texas. What if space time behaves like a super solid, meaning it has both fluid like flow and crystal like structure? Could black holes actually be long lived topological defects in that medium rather than singularities? And if so, instead of destroying information, might they encode it in stable patterns or scars in spacetime itself, potentially releasing it later as structured gravitational wave echoes or even retro casual signals? This is a really basic question and I wish this guy would be a little smarter. Wow, that's a great question.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That question is so trivial. I'll let you take it.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, you know, I'm a big fan of crystal light. It's like a lemonade, but it doesn't have all the calories. Is that what we're talking about here?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So I like the notion that something we think of as just empty space is reinterpreted as a medium within which you can embed information. I like where he's going there. And we know how you make a black hole. So if you can make a black hole in this medium, then the black hole itself is not some blemish that's there. When we look at crystals, they're imperfections within crystals that make for some interesting properties. Some of those imperfections give them certain color hues because the light doesn't go through. Smoothly structured. Yeah, yeah. And so. But a black hole is a very natural phenomenon. So I can't think of it as an imperfection. I refuse to think of it as an imperfection. But if a black hole has the power to send out ripples into that medium that contain echoes of what happened inside and that then somehow gets embedded in that medium, that's a cool idea. The question is, what? So here's what you do. When you have an idea, however outlandish, you ask, how would we test it? Is there some light echo left by a black hole in the middle of empty space that we should be looking for? Is there some scar or record within the fabric of space and time that would betray the existence of these black holes or other imperfections? And you'd have to pose the question in a way that. That our telescopes can answer. Otherwise, it's just fun science fiction.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, what about his supposition? What if space time behaves like a super solid, Meaning that it's both fluid like flow and crystal like structure? Do we believe there is a super solid?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Well, that's the what if? And then if it is, then it would somehow capture these echoes in its substance. If it is a thing. Right. And it's probably not all it would capture. There'd be some other phenomena.

[Paul Mercurio]

When we say echo in this context, we mean sort of what happened. The after effects of a black hole being formed.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, just a black hole. Being a black hole, does it vibrate? Does it trigger some pulse? Is there a gravitational wave that has information embedded within it? So, yeah, I don't have a problem thinking that way. But if you're gonna do that, you want to come up with predictions.

[Paul Mercurio]

Do we have that ability to come up with predictions?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, it would be his job.

[Paul Mercurio]

Wow. Okay, wait.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If he's gonna take up that question, I'm leaving it to him to come.

[Paul Mercurio]

When did you semi retire from science? I'm damn tired. That's another trope in every movie. I'm tired. I can't do this. I'm too damn old for this. Well, that was a great question. And all right, it. I think we've wrapped up. We've gotta. We've gotta.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right, we're good. Probably didn't get them get to them all.

[Paul Mercurio]

No, we did not.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right, maybe next time.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes. Paul, great to see.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We'll find you. So what are your next cities?

[Paul Mercurio]

So on my website, PaulMicurio.com we'll find you. There's. I'm right there. You can't miss me homepage in my speedo.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And after. And after May 21st, if you need your lawn mowed, I'm the guy who

[Paul Mercurio]

wants mayonnaise on their sandwich. I'm the guy I can do any

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

of that Last Colbert show.

[Paul Mercurio]

Colbert show. And. And yeah, Kind of weird and strange, but it is weird and strange.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right, dude, thanks for coming on.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. Great to see you.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right. This has been startalk Cosmic queries. Grab bag fan favorite Neil degrasse Tyson here as always, bidding you to keep looking up. Out on the road. It helps to have a partner like

[Paul Mercurio]

the love's Rewards app.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Download Love's Rewards and get great deals like a free Loves coffee or fountain drink. Just buy any four any size and get the fifth one free.

[Paul Mercurio]

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[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Save and earn at every turn. Terms apply. See website for details.

[Paul Mercurio]

The Jack Welch Management Institute at Strayer University helps you go from I know the way to I've arrived with our top 10 ranked online MBA. Gain skills you can learn today and apply tomorrow. Get ready to go from make it happen to Made it happen and keep striving. Visit strayer.edu Jack Welchmba to learn more. Strayer University is certified to operate in Virginia by Chevin as many campuses, including at 2121 15th Street north in Arlington, Virginia.