StarTalk Radio - #ICYMI: Baseball TweetTalk, with Neil deGrasse Tyson

Episode Date: August 17, 2017

In the latest installment of our popular episodes where hosts Chuck Nice and Gary O’Reilly invite Neil deGrasse Tyson into the studio to explain the thinking behind his popular, and sometimes controversial, sport tweets, we turn our attention to baseball.Don’t miss an episode of Playing with Science. Subscribe to our channels on:Apple Podcasts: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/playing-with-science/id1198280360?mt=2GooglePlay Music: https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/Iimke5bwpoh2nb25swchmw6kzjqSoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/startalk_playing-with-scienceStitcher: http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/startalk/playing-with-scienceTuneIn: http://www.tunein.com/playingwithscienceNOTE: StarTalk All-Access subscribers can watch/listen to this entire episode commercial-free. Find out more at https://www.startalkradio.net/startalk-all-access/ Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ on Apple Podcasts to listen to new episodes ad-free and a whole week early.

Today we return to their expanding universe that is Twittersphere and explore the thoughts of the doctor. The man, the myth, the legend. Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson! Yay! I didn't know I was a myth. Well, mythical. Mythical.

Oh, you are not indeed. You are not a myth. I don't mind being a myth. I'm just saying I didn't know. I see you are here in corporeal form, so I cannot call you a myth. Corporeal form. Ooh. Showing off that SAT vocabulary.

Raise the bar. Corporeal. Somebody bought a word of the day calendar. Corporal. What's tomorrow's? I'm going that far. I think tomorrow is obstreperous. I'm going to go with that.

No, no, no, no, no. You got to stay in the mood and say, if today's corporeal, tomorrow's ethereal. Yes, absolutely. Very good. There you go. Neil is a man of words. He loves words.

And so I appreciate that. But mainly in less than 140 characters. Yes, it would be fewer than 140 characters. Thank you kindly. See the grammar. The grammar has now brought itself forward. Grammar in the house. You're a Brit.

You're supposed to know this. We're supposed to be jealous of your command of the language. Why are you staying out of this? We've supposed to be jealous of your command of the language. Why are you staying out of this? Could you listen? We've loosened our grips slightly. This is too good

for me to interrupt. We have loosened our grips slightly on the grammar and we've allowed you to run free with it. Oh, thank you. That's why we are divided by a common language.

Okay. Thank you, Churchill. Thank you, yeah. On the beaches. Here we go. So this is our tweet show. Yes. And we have the tweet and chief, the tweeter and chief, On the beaches Here we go So this is our tweet show Yes And we have

The tweet and chief The tweeter and chief Neil deGrasse Tyson Oh you plucked my tweets From the Twittersphere once again Yes we do Yeah yeah yeah

This is a school day for us This really is Front row of the class You are now I hope I remember my tweets That you pull out Okay What do you got here

In baseball Or maybe you should read them I can do it of the class. You are now in session. I hope I remember my tweets that you pull out. Okay, what do you got here? In baseball. Or maybe you should read them. I can do it. It's your voice. Rarely, maybe one in a hundred tweets, if that often, I will present an opinion. Ooh. And other tweets may feel like opinions. They're written with passion,

as most opinions are, but they're actually just facts. Passionately conveyed facts facts passionately conveyed fashionately factual Yes, but this one you this one I'm ready to read is a opinion you ready. This is opinion. Okay In baseball if a pitch hits you on ball four you should get to advance to second base Wow, so Ball four, you should get to advance to second base. Wow. So? Well, because if you're hit by a pitch, you take first base. Ball four, you take first base.

If you're hit by a pitch on ball four, you go to second base. Right, because what you just gave the pitcher was a free pass at beaning somebody. That's right. It's like, hey, what do I got to lose? It's ball four. I don't like this guy. He's going to take a base anyway. Let me just pop him one.

Are you worried that the batter might intentionally get hit by the ball? Right. Step across. I mean, you know what? If I'm waving up, I'm going to step across. Yeah, but you could do that for any pitch, and why don't you? Because it's ball four, and now we've introduced the math. I think by the time you get to first base,

there's an attorney waiting for you to argue the case against you progressing. I'm going to say that guys who lean into a pitch and take a hit, they got cojones. They deserve that base because I believe that ball might be traveling somewhere around 90 miles an hour. Plus or minus 90 miles an hour. It hurts. If you know the pitcher doesn't have that kind of heat, and that's not his thing. Maybe you take the percentages. Maybe you gauge. I don't know enough about baseball rules to know if you intentionally go into the strike zone with your body and get hit.

Is that really getting hit by a pitch? Oh, no. Guys have done that. There are guys who have leaned into the strike zone. Yeah, they've leaned in. Looked through some rule. Oh, no. The ball is slightly, the ball's on the edge.

Yeah. Okay. And so, of course, it's a judgment call at that point. And so, you lean into the pitch because you want to take that base. You're guaranteed that base. Yeah, but if you lean into a strike, I don't think they give you your base. No, well,

that's true. That attorney's coming back. Oh, can we look that up, Garrett? Yeah. Garrett, can you look that up? If you lean into what is clearly a strike and take a hit... I don't think... I think it's a strike. What is the rule that up? If you lean into what is clearly a strike and take a hit, I don't think it's a strike. What is the rule in baseball? Will you be awarded a base or will you be called for perhaps something like interference?

So is our listener's own. It's interference. Yeah, because it's head of our legal team. And he's right now sourcing a definitive answer to that question. And as soon as we get it, you'll have it. I like the concept, though. Ball four, you get hit. You get a second.

You get two bases since you would have gotten a base anyway. You would have gotten a base anyway. So that was just my opinion. I just thought if we needed a new rule in baseball, that should work. Anything to liven this game up, as far as I'm concerned. in this game up as far as I'm concerned. But JP Arancibia, who is a former catcher, a Major League Baseball catcher,

gave us some really interesting insights. And we had Holden Kushner on, who's a host for TuneIn on their Major League Baseball, and they were saying they are looking to really get something going to get this thing up and invigorated. So I don't know whether you've struck a little bit of a vein there, a little bit of a golden vein. Basically, what JP was saying was that the league is looking for ways to make the game more exciting. And he said it in the most diplomatic way possible because he's a former Major League Baseball player. Because, you know, the flip side of that coin is the game is boring.

Right. That's the flip side, you know. It's slow. It's slow, right. And it's not boring to the person who's a purist. It's not boring to the guy who sits there with that little card. That's why they won't. I've seen them at the ball games and they're keeping, you know, that's a person who loves or somebody like me who loves a pitching duel.

You know what I mean? Because that to me. Here's the thing, I love the tension that builds during a pitching duel. In my day, and I'm older than both of you, long baseball games were two hours. That was a long baseball game. And it would not be uncommon to have a 90-minute

baseball game, at most 100 minutes. And nowadays, they bottom out at two hours, and they typically go three, three and a half. Right. And so why the length? Why the change of length? So watch, because I did this experiment once.

Okay. So back in the video days, where there's like videotape, I said, I wonder how long the action of a full nine-inning baseball game takes. Oh, I'm with you. So you just edit out all the time stuff. Nobody's happening. Right. The whole game, 15, 20 minutes.

The entire game? The entire game. When you just edit out everything that is superfluous. The time where they're running in from the outfield to switch innings. The time after the pitch. So here's what happened. In the old days, the batter never left the batter's box. Right.

Nowadays, every pitch, the batter steps out, they hit the cleats with the bat. Well, there's a reason for that. They'll rub their hands in the dirt, they'll spit on them. It's funny, I read a science... The whole at-bat ritual didn't used to be there. And all it takes, think about it,

if it previously took you one minute, now it takes you three minutes at your at-bat. Everybody takes three times longer to be at-bat. Just to bat, right. Just to bat. But there's a whole load of psychological rituals. Well, that's not a ritual. It's actually neuroscience.

When you see a pitch and you stay in the batter's box, you don't walk away, and the pitcher throws you another pitch, you will see the last pitch. So your brain... Oh, he's shaking it off. Right. Your brain will say, here it comes again, when it's not. So your brain lies to you

about the pitch that you're seeing. No. So you walk out of the batter's box... Get a fresh entry back in. And get a fresh entry back in. So that's why they do that. Okay, so... Are you serious?

No, I'm serious. There's neuroscience behind that. Are you saying that Major League Baseball studied the neuroscience research papers? Yes. Sure. Well, according to the Scientific American article that I read about four or five years ago. There's brain training in baseball in terms of seeing the pitch. We can probably get into that.

But getting back to your little bit of hatred for baseball, or slightly hatred? Spectrum. Did that word come out of my mouth? Where did that come from? Wait a minute. Get back to your hatred for the game. Using your vocabulary. So when you take baseball

and you reduce it down to its action only, you can do that for any team sport, any tennis match, soccer game, NFL game. Baseball isn't alone. So when you hang it up there like that. In tennis, the time you're playing versus the time you're not playing is vastly greater than it is for baseball.

No, no, no, I don't. But I'm saying if you want the highlights, you can play as many tricks as you like with editing to reduce that down to say, this wasn't a great game, whichever sport it is. All I'm saying, when I said the baseball could last 15 to 20 minutes, I'm not talking about highlights. I'm talking about every single pitch.

Right. All right. Every single pitch. So does this come with television's influence into the sport of baseball? Well, because they're selling ad time, so sure. And then the media guys got into buying major league franchises, didn't they? Yes.

So, well, what you have is, you have collaborations, if that's the right word, between a professional team and a broadcast network. So you have the Yes Network. Didn't Disney own the Yankees at one stage? I don't know. Disney? We put Murdoch.

I'm thinking if they did, I would have heard about it. Yeah, sure. I don't know, because I'm native of the Bronx. No, no, no. I may be spreading disinformation, which seems quite popular these days. All right. So now we ask the question whether or not a batter who leans into a pitch that is clearly a strike, does he get the walk? And here is explanations of rule 6.08.

Hit by pitch. Situation one. Batter takes his or her position in the batter's box with their arms extended into the strike zone. Batter is hit on the arm by the pitch while not swinging. Not swinging. Ruling. Dead ball. Time.

Okay? Strike on the batter. No award. So, it's a strike. You're right. The batter does not get to take a base when he leans. And it's a strike. It's a strike.

He's given a strike. Situation two? Situation two, batter swings and misses the pitch, and the pitch touches the batter. Ruling, dead ball, strike on the batter. No award. So the swing outweighs the ball contact. Exactly. So you swing and get hit, you're struck.

You struck out. Don't try to clean it up by taking a— Situation three. What do you have here? Situation three. Batter takes proper position in the batter's box. Pitch is inside, and the batter makes no attempt to avoid being touched by the pitch. Ruling.

Dead ball. In other words, he took the hit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He just took it. Ruling, no award. So they just get, it just counts as a ball

even though you got hit. Counts as a ball even though you got hit. So you have to actually actively get out of the way of the pitch. So it looks as though the ruling is this.

If you are not, if you look like you are intentionally in any way taking a hit, they're not going to give it to you. Or passively or actively. Passively or actively. Whether you just stand there and don't get out of the way look like you are intentionally in any way taking a hit, they're not going to give it to you. Or passively or actively.

Passively or actively. Whether you just stand there and don't get out of the way or whether you lean into it either way, you can't take the hit. They want you to hit that ball, don't they? Wow. Interesting. Interesting. Well, thank you, Garrett, for giving us the rules. Thank you to our legal team.

Our crack research team there. Absolutely. However, it still says, it's still a pretty cool and interesting prospect to say. You know what? That if you take a hit on fall four. Yes, it will find its way back at Major League Baseball HQ. It's just an offering. That's all.

Right. All right. That's all. There you go. All right. So we move on to another tweet, please. Another baseball tweet, please. Let's bring it up.

Neil. This is nasty. Okay. All right. Careful observation. That was me doing the statistics on this. All right. Careful observation reveals that players and coaches of a three-hour baseball game spit at least six gallons of saliva onto the field.

Oh, my God. Wait a minute. Now, Neil. What? First of all, why? Why? That's number one. Why?

What are you, William Shatner? Why? Why? Why would you? Why would you measure spit like that? That's number one. that. That's number one. But what

I want to know is how do you measure the spit? The spittle itself. So you want to know the anatomy of this calculation. Yes, exactly. Because we've got this far. We might as well have everything. Okay, alright, so here you go. You ready? Go ahead.

So, I made an assumption, which could be off by a little bit, and so then you just scale the answer appropriately, that every time you spit, you're spitting one cubic centimeter of liquid. Okay. A cubic centimeter is not that much. That's not a lot. Not a lot.

Those guys are hawking some loogies. They're hawking loogies. Yeah. Loogies. Right. Loogies. Yeah, loogies, man. Hawk a loogie?

Hawk a loogie. Hawk a loogie? Hawk a loogie. Hawk a loogie. Hawk a loogie. Okay, so that was first assumption. Okay? Now, here's how you make the measurement. Watch the camera focus on one player and another. Okay? Okay.

One out of four times In the five seconds The camera's on a player The player's spitting Is it like yawning? It's a contagious thing Once the first guy spits They all kind of get No, the camera's looking at the player

The players aren't looking at one another They're not really looking at each other So I could Even though that would be kind of cool If spitting was contagious That if in these four or five, five second bits. Right. A player is always spitting.

Okay. That means every player is spitting once every 30 seconds. Okay. Okay. All right. And so once every 30 seconds. Yes. Of course of the game.

So now you have 25 players. Now they're players not on the field. Right. Players sitting down. So you're counting them as spitting too? Of course. They're spitting in the dugout.

Just look at them. Oh my God, I am getting sick. Okay, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. So you have, I think it's 25 active players and the dugout,

you know, you got the bullpen and the dugout and the players on the field. Okay? So every player spitting. By the way, it's really reliable.

Just do your own measurement. Look at how often the camera's on a player and how often any random player is spitting. You get loogie cam. Oh my! Now you're nasty.

Loogie cam. Your observation wasn't... So, it's one cubic centimeter of saliva every 30 seconds from every player for three hours. Oh, God. And it just simply adds up. That's all I'm saying. Are you conscious of the fact that you may well have underestimated?

Well, so it could be. So did I say approximately? Yeah. Yeah. It should be. So did I say approximately? Yeah. But no, honestly, it's clearly an underestimate based on the time and you're using one cubic centimeter. Right.

Which, like I said, that's not a lot comparatively. Except I tried spitting and I could not spit one cubic centimeter. You're not chewing that stuff. Yeah, but you've got to chew the crap. I've got to chew the tobacco. Right, you've got to chew the crap. I've got to chew the tobacco. Right, you've got to chew the tobacco. Now there are people who don't spit saliva, such as A-Rod. A-Rod spits shells of... The nuts, yeah. Of...

Pistachio, no. No, the other one. Sunflower seeds. Sunflower seeds. So he's spitting shells of sunflower seeds. So that's not... So that still takes up volume. shells of sunflower seeds.

So that's not, so that still takes up volume. So this mixture would be like hocked loogies, shells of nuts, as well as just pure saliva. You know what, I don't know why, but I am so hungry right now.

Chewing tobacco. Now, how many games in a season for a major league? 162. How many teams? There's, how many teams are there?

I have no idea. 32 teams, something like that. I don't know. A lot. Yeah, so this is a lot of saliva. It's a lot of, yeah, it's a lot of spit. I had a team. By the way, I used to spit because I thought it was cool.

Right. When I was in middle school. Right. And I found myself generating more saliva for having done so. After about a week of it. The more you spit, the more you have. Yeah, the more you have to spit. Right.

Strange, you talking about the spitting and the professional players, I had a teammate who was so, young player, was so nervous, he would sit there and just spit. Really? Unconsciously, just spit, but pure nerves. I can just hear people out there right now going. It's totally like gacking. So here's my thing.

So the good thing about a simple calculation, so what I say, six gallons. So if I converted cubic centimeters to imperial gallons correctly, let's assume I did that correctly just for the moment. So if we find out the average spit is a half a cubic centimeter or two cubic centimeters, then it goes, it's three gallons or 12 gallons.

It's a very simple. The point is, it's a lot of spit. Yeah, it's a veritable tsunami of spit. Yes. Yes. So I thought Lugicam, I think it will be the future of the game. It's an awful lot more than we ever considered. Yeah, that's the.

All right. I say we move along. Let's do a teaser. Why don't you read your next one? Okay. Because we only have less than a minute left. Here it is. Go ahead.

Hand-stitched balls, rubbing mud, leather mitts, wooden bats, pine tar. Baseball. A game untouched by modern materials. Okay, that's pretty good, man. Yeah, it's the old ways. I'm just saying. Baseball, we fear change. No, is it better or is it worse?

Well, if changing materials will improve the performance of the player, I think you should do it. Absolutely. Because you go to see performance. You don't go to see the absence of performance. There you go. So if a, now I'm told that, we'll pick it up.

You ran out of time. Yeah, we're out of time, but we'll pick it up when we get back. Pick it up when we get back. I'm ready for it. Wood versus aluminium. Another thing we got in with JP and Ancibia. So we'll take that break.

We'll have more baseball. Thoughts of the good doctor. And we'll tell you what aluminium is when we get back welcome back I'm Gary O'Reilly and I'm Chuck Nice and this is Playing With Science

we are exploring the tweets of Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson and focusing most definitely on the sport of baseball before the break we were discussing

pintar hand-stitched balls wooden bats and getting into most definitely on the sport of baseball. Before the break, we were discussing pine tar, hand-stitched balls, wooden bats, and getting into old versus new. Now, when we spoke to JP Arancibia, and we spoke with Charles Liu, what's the best material you could have for a baseball bat? And Charles went with aluminium. Absolutely.

JP said, oh baby, I'm a power hitter. Give me that aluminium bat, please. Yes, yes, yes. So the aluminium. So what I was told by a sabermetrician, someone who thinks long and hard and deep about everything, every bit of detail in baseball that even baseball fans would not care about, just to put this on scale.

What he told me was that in professional baseball and MLB, if the batters used an aluminum bat, it would kill the pitchers because it would come off the bat fast. Right now, they barely have enough time. To react. To react. Correct. Ooh. To react. To react. Correct. Ooh.

Barely. They can just get a mitt in front of their face and not get hit by the ball. With an aluminum bat, that time is dropped to below their reaction limits, and you would basically harm. So you would increase the exit velocity to a point where reaction would not be possible. Where at a typical hard hit ball, we'll reach the pitcher before the pitcher can react and you will hurt the pitcher.

Yo, I am all about this. See, that's the other side of the coin. This is awesome. You just made baseball my favorite sport. So you can use an aluminum bat and hit a 400-foot home run every time and you'd kill the pitcher. You'd just drill a hole through.

Now see, I'm paying for this. This is where I knew it would go. I will pay to go see this. Fans want this. So this is kind of like batter's revenge to the pitcher. Love it. The batter's revenge on the pitcher. You would only sort of accidentally hit it back to the pitcher

because you don't have that much control. I was going to say, you would have to be the best. First of all, if you could do that, you would never hit the pitcher. You would just place the ball out of the park every single time and be the greatest home run hitter ever. Ever. So that would be like batter's revenge on the fact that you're a sitting duck in front of a 90-mile-an-hour fastball. Wow. But I'm just saying, that's what he told me.

And so I had no reason to doubt what he said. We should get a poll as to whether or not they want to see the pitcher in danger or whether they want to see something else going on. I just want to see the sports report that evening. Tragically, another death today in Major League Baseball. No, you've got to lighten it up. You say, another busted nose. Right, exactly.

Yeah, don't make it break it out. Right, right. Led to another fractured orbital bone. Yeah, occipital, orbital. Yeah, right. Oh, that's cool, exactly. Yeah, don't make it break. Right, right. Led to another fractured orbital bone. Yeah, occipital, orbital. Yeah, right. Oh, that's cool, man. Wow, that's fascinating. So that would be a little bit of a...

That would make sense. How about some other things? So for example, so they use pine tar so they can be sticky. Surely there's some artificial stickiness that works better than pine tar. Well, the gloves now. What's that? The gloves now. Gloves, gloves will do it.

Yeah. Gloves, you know, in fact, you can put the material that the pass receivers use. Right. Have you ever felt the gel material?

Right, that gel material like Odell and Beckham. Odell and Beckham Jr. when the Nike Innovation team came in and they'd explored a whole draft of different surfaces.

And so your hand goes up, the ball just hits and sticks to your hand. So gloves help that. Then you don't need the pine tar. But it was kind of fun to watch old time, like the Yankee catcher from a few years back. He didn't wear gloves. He just—

Peña? Yogi. Not Peña. Yogi. We're going way back. Way back. Posada. Posada. Posada. All right, we go ahead. Posada. Not Peña. Yogi. We're going way back. Way back. Posada. Posada.

All right, we go ahead. Jorge Posada. Jorge Posada. No gloves. My boy, just there it was in the pine tar, and it was sticky, and there he was. Fans love him for that. I just thought it was something classic about that. Oh, that's cool.

These wusses that need gloves. So, yeah, the gloves will improve your grip, but also, if the glove is too spongy, then your hand is not actual, your hand has give against the surface of the bat. And fractions of an inch

make a difference between a pop-up and a home run, a difference between a home run and a... I'm guessing for a catcher and his mitt, the intimacy and feel that has to come through the hand, through the leather, and be able to feel that they've got total caress on that ball when they catch it.

Here we go. I'm taking it to another place now. Look at that. Oh, man, baby, this is my glove. Here we go. Playing with science after hours. Whose glove is this is my glove. Here we go. My glove. Play me science after hours. My glove. Whose glove is this?

Whose glove is this? So what they could do, so holding materials aside, what they could easily do is have a laser-measured strike zone. And then you don't need the umpire. And they do it in... Oh, yeah. Oh, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Excuse me. Wait, wait.

They basically have it in tennis. Yes, they do. They do, but however... And they do it in... Oh, yeah. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Excuse me. Wait, wait. They basically have it in tennis? Yes, they do. They do, but... However... And they accepted it? You've got to listen to the baseball show we do with... J.P. Arncibia.

Oh, because... He talks about what you just said. He opens the book on the umpire. He gives us a little peek behind the curtain of what goes on with the umpires. I'm not voting this way. What I'm saying is...

No, no, no, no, I'm saying is you could do that, and it would be precise every time. Prompting a debate. So now, but I don't have a horse in this race, if I can mix sports. Okay, sure, I'm there. I don't have a ball in this glove, all right? All right.

Whose glove is this? I like this glove. I like this nice glove. I like it. It's a nice glove. Two of these. I want one on each hand. So here's the interesting thing. Go ahead.

What makes baseball interesting is not knowing if the umpire is going to accurately call the ball or the strike right the edges of the strike zone and this creates another dimension of uncertainty for the batter right because the pitcher wants to throw a strike but if they throw a strike you're more likely to hit it so they have to throw something that looks like a strike so that you try to hit it and you don't get good wood on the ball. So it is cat and mouse like no other one-on-one encounter in professional sports. There is another dimension to that, Chuck. Awesome, yeah.

Well, no, and that's very salient, what you just said. And then what JP told us was that in addition to that, there is a political aspect because when you mouth off to an umpire, he then says, oh, really? Okay. And what he'll do then is not give you the calls. He sends you to the naughty base. And you're everyone's.

Yeah. So, yeah, don't., so plus, they'll give you... I saw umpires give Jeter a call that they were not giving some other players who were just nasty players. Well, that just makes sense. I mean, come on. He's dreamy Derek Jeter. Are you kidding me?

Dreamy. God, it's gorgeous. Okay. All right, let's go to another tweet before Chuck just really melts. Completely melts into Jeter's arms. All right, here we go. another tweet before Chuck just really melts into Peter's arms. All right, here we go. Next up.

All right, this is physics 101 right here. I just thought I'd toss it out there. Laws of physics show that it takes twice as much energy to throw a baseball 100 miles an hour than it does to throw one at 70 miles an hour. Interesting. Twice as much energy. That's why it's so hard. How many people throw 100 miles an hour? 100 miles an hour? Interesting. Okay. That's as much energy. That's why it's so hard. How many people throw 100 miles an hour?

100 miles an hour race? Well, right. How many? Like five ever? You know, I mean, how many people? That number is not as high as you think it would be, given how many people throw 90 miles an hour. Now, here's the deal.

I know that that is physics 101. Yes. But there are a lot of people out there who don't know why that is. So maybe you should tell them why. Good cover. Well done. No one saw through that. And plus you saved me from saying it.

So in physics, once we finally learned what energy was and characterized it and what forms it can take, that birthed the Industrial Revolution. Just so you know how important this is. So energy and your ability to transform it from one form to another is the foundation of every machine we've ever built. Gotcha. All right, with you, yes. Okay, so why do cars work?

Because we take chemical energy in the fuel and convert it to mechanical energy, which is you moving down the street. The piston's going up and down. Where did the chemical energy come from? It came from living matter that once got its energy from the sun, plant life that was buried and got converted into fuel. So we have sunlight converting to chemical energy,

converting to mechanical energy. And once we learned this, it blew open civilization. So pictures are solar powered. That's right. Ultimately, we are all solar powered. There you go. Because even if you eat steak, it's some cow.

What does the cow eat? Grass. How did the grass grow? Photosynthesis. And where does the sun get its energy from? I'm going to say, oh, wow, you got me on that one. It is thermonuclear fusion. I was about to say the plasma that is so-called burning. Yeah, yeah. So we are thermonuclear fusion driven.

Right. Ultimately. I like it. I like it very much. I'm going to get that badge in the back. Thermonuclear fusion. So this was the problem. I saw there's a bumper sticker, one of these sort of green bumper stickers, left-leaning green bumper stickers. It says, no nukes. No nukes. And the O in the no is the sun. Right. I'm thinking, no.

There you go. No, no, because that's still thermal. Excuse me. I know what you mean. Right. But the physics of this doesn't play. Right, exactly. Because how the hell do you think the sun is making its own damn energy?

Did you, like, go by them and flip them the bird and go, you call me, and keep going? No, no, no. News, exactly. Because how the hell do you think the sun is making its own damn energy? Did you like go by them and flip them the bird and go you commie and keep going? No, no, no. Commie liberal bastard you! Hold them over and then just give them the one-to-one lecture. I don't get angry with people for not knowing. As an educator.

Of course, right. The pitcher, Yank him out of the car, drag him to the side of the road and then you give them a lecture. That'd be so funny. Aurelius Chapman, is it? First of all, wait. He burns it at 100 and something. So here you go.

So energy scales. So one form of energy is kinetic energy, the energy of being in motion. So anything in motion has kinetic energy. And there's a formula for that. It's one half times the mass of the thing times the velocity of the thing squared. Okay. All right.

We're squaring. We're squaring. So baseball at 70 miles an hour, square 70, what do you get? You get 490. Okay. Square 100 miles an hour, what do you get? 100 times 100. 100 times 100. 100 times 100.

Hey, factually correct. Is it like that? Factually correct. Sorry, 70 squared is 4,900. Okay, I said that wrong. 7 times 7 is 49. You carry the two zeros. 4,900.

So put a pin in that number. You square 100 miles an hour, you get 10,000. And 10,000 is about twice 4,000. Right, 490 times, right. That's how you get it. So 100 squared is basically twice what 70 squared is. I could have said 72 or whatever would get you exactly. Right, that would have given you an example.

But who cares? Who cares, right? It's the idea. So to go from 70 to 100, twice as much power is needed there. Correct. Now, I went to one of those

MLB traveling arcades. Okay. You ever been to one of those where there's a pitching cage? Yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah, and it's just fun and there's a bunch of trucks

that they open up and you go in and you play. It's a great PR for MLB. Right. And they had a pitching cage. And so I thought, let me throw. I'm an in-shape guy, like I was at the time. Right.

Yeah, I have strength, I have speed, I have agility. I took the ball, and I threw it as fast as I possibly could. It went like 72 miles an hour. That's not a bad pitch. No, excuse me. If a pitcher in MLB throws 70, it's a... Well, you can't play Major League Baseball. Now the slow ball.

That's called an off-speed pitch. That's called an off-speed pitch. I'm putting everything I got into this pitch. The thing is, you would fool a Major League batsman with that pitch because he's thinking, here comes the heat. Swing it at a ball. Here comes Tyson. Badass Tyson.

And they don't know that's all I got. 70 mile an hour pitch. So you just square it. And this is why, for example, it is much more dangerous to drive. You got a quick calculator here? Yes, he's called you. So if you drive. Go ahead. Yeah, so if you're driving

50 miles an hour Okay Okay And square that What do you get? 2,500 2,500 Okay

So what is the square root of 5,000? Oh, God That's a good one We don't need God for this one I do Thank God for the really hard calculations What is it? Do you know which button the square root button is? No. We don't need God for this one. I do. And God for the really hard calculations. What is it? The square root button is.

I don't. No, they don't have one. Flip 5,000. You have one that works. I got one here. Please be patient, listener. These hosts of the game here. Okay, so what did we say? We said

50 squared was 5,000. So 50 squared was 2,500. So now we want 5,000 square root. Okay. And we get 70. So if you're driving at 70 miles an hour, your car has twice the kinetic energy than at 50. What it means is if you are in a head-on collision,

there's twice as much energy that has to dissipate by the time everything stops moving. And that energy goes into crushing the car, breaking the glass, goes into the sound of the collision, and it goes into crushing the squishy things that are inside the car itself. Right.

Human beings. Unless, of course, you are ejected and go through the front windshield. Right. Then you go through the front windshield at 70 miles an hour. 70 miles an hour. Then you'll hit something else at 70 miles an hour.

Where does that kinetic energy go? If you hit a brick wall, nothing happening in a brick wall. Right, exactly. All that energy gets put back into your body. Right, and you look like a Rorschach test against the wall. So going back to the nicer...

This is so pleasant. That's what I like about this conversation. and the energy variation. If I've got a guy who's six foot five, really long levers, I'm on a mound,

so I am pitching down invariably. His name is Randy Jackson. Randy Johnson. Randy Jackson, that's the lost Jackson brother. Right, that's the lost Jackson brother.

Lesser Jackson. Who was not as good as a pitcher. Does the length of the lever not then mean I have less need to upgrade the energy? He's talking about angle of release. You're a tall guy. If I've got a longer lever and I'm bringing it to bear on my feet. It's easier for you to hit 100 miles an hour is what you're saying.

To get that speed with a longer lever, do I not need to use less energy? You still have to. Well, so here's the thing. If you pivot at your shoulder, you have a really long arm, then if we are both pivoting our shoulder at the same rate, but my arm is longer, that ball is moving faster at the end of that.

Right. But you still have to, the ball has a mass, you have to, and your arm has mass, so your muscle has to be, so it's not the same thing happening. No. So, so, back up.

Yes, two arms swinging at the same angular speed, if I have longer arms, I'm throwing the ball faster than you are. But I have to move my arm as fast as you're moving your arm, and it takes me more energy to do so. Right. Oh, cool. Okay.

Oh, that's cool. That's right. That was just kind of wrinkled. I've got to accelerate the ball and the weight of my own arm. So it's the same thing as when you have two things on a string, and you're swinging them at one string is shorter, and the other string is longer. Yes, yes.

And the two things on the end of the string, one is going to be going faster on the longer string. On the longer string. But it takes more energy to move that. To generate that speed. Move that and keep that going and to generate that. Cool. See, for my logic, it would have been the other way around,

which is why I asked the question, because I think you were going to bust that myth. That's why we have, yeah, so I don't know how you got your logic because you said by your logic. We'll work on your logic. My logic against yours is not a fair competition. No, but the good thing about taking physics classes

is that you learn the logic of the universe and that replaces the logic of your life. Well, the logic of our universe right now is that we do have to take a break. Let's do that. We are past time. We ran over, sorry. We ran over, but guess what? It was worth it, and that we do have to take a break. Let's do that. We are past. We ran over. We ran over, but guess what?

It was worth it. And so we're going to take a break and we'll be right back with more Neil deGrasse Tyson and his tweets. I'm Gary O'Reilly. I'm Chuck Nice. We are honored to have Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson with us and his various numerous tweets. And we are sinking our teeth into baseball. What do you got here? If baseball reported averages to four decimal places instead of three,

then a 300 hitter would be batting 3,000. Okay. Well, that makes sense. Well, so I just want to make it clear to people, when he's always batting 300. Right. Mathematically, that's not what he's batting. He's batting.300.

Right. Okay. So he's actually batting three-tenths. Right. Exactly. So three out of ten times, he gets a hit. Gets a hit. Right.

So— It's basically a 70%—he's at a 70% failure rate. Failure rate. Exactly. It's basically a 70% failure rate. Exactly. It's what he is. Where you can fail 70% of the time and still get in. You're an awesome player. You still get in the Hall of Fame.

So it's just by tradition that we carry an extra two decimal places beyond the first one. So technically, he's batting 300 out of 1,000. Okay. Okay. But you're 300 out of 1,000. Okay. Okay. But you're leaving off the 1,000. And if it's just a pure 300 hitter, you're batting three, three-tenths. Any of these would work the same way as saying you're batting 300. But we don't say they're batting.3.

We just don't. Right. It's not in the tradition of the reporting of the game. And it also makes them seem like losers. Now it turns out later in the season, you want to carry a fourth decimal because a single at-bat has a much lower torque on your average than it does at the beginning of the season. Think about it. Okay, explain more for me. I'll tell you.

Please. I'll tell you. All right? I've played one game this season. I've had four at-bats. Okay. I happen to get four hits. Oh, shoot.

So what's my batting average? The best. What's my batting average? Batting 1,000. 1,000. You're batting one. Batting one. Batting one.

Okay. Now the next game, I'm 0 for 4. So now I have eight total at-bats with four hits. I'm batting 500. Okay, now the next game, I'm 0 for 4. So now I have eight total at-bats with four hits. I'm batting 500. Batting 500. The next game, I'm 0 for 4 again. All right, now I'm still batting 250. 250?

250. Is that right? No, you'd be batting, no, point, no, you're batting three. No, because what do I have? Oh, no, because I have 12 hits. I mean, I have 12 at-bats now. And four hits. And four hits. Okay, so I'm not. No, no, no, you're batting three. No, because what do I have? Oh, no, because I have 12 hits. I mean, I have 12 at bats now. And four hits. And four hits.

Okay, so I'm not. No, no, no, four out of 12, it's 4-8-12. Right. So you go down to, now you're batting 3-3-3-3-3. Right, right. So you're jumping much, many more digits early in the season because the average has fewer, has a smaller baseline on which to calculate it. Gotcha.

Okay? By the end of the season, you're at bat 1,000 times or 500 times. A single at bat is touching maybe that last decimal place. Gotcha. So you add a fourth decimal place, and then you're back in business watching what you're doing. Cool. Yeah. Cool.

That phrase, statistics and damn lies. Oh, lies, damn lies, and statistics? So you can manufacture that statistic to say whatever really you want it to say. No. No. Not with batting averages. I miss 70% of the time. I'm having three.

It's however you want to twist that. Well, they're both accurate. Yes, absolutely. It's just what attitude you want to cop. Right. Yeah. I see what you're saying. It's really a marketing thing. It's just what attitude you want to copy. Right. Yeah. I see what you're saying. It's really a marketing thing.

This is how you want to present it. All right. Well, that's cool. All right. Let's move on. Let's get another tweet in. Get another tweet in. Next up.

Baseball should track extraordinary plays that fielders can bank and then credit against errors they might later commit. This is another opinion. Okay. I don't know if I'm following you there. Okay, so you ready? You ready? I'm running after the ball. I'm an outfielder.

I'm running after the ball. I do a shoestring catch, and I tumble, roll, roll back to my feet and throw the guy out at second base. All right. Okay? That's going to make a highlight reel. Yes, it is. The next game I make an error, that play should cancel out the error.

That's all. Nah, I'm going to have to push back on that. Oh! Yes! Oh, body. No way. I want to bank that extraordinary play. No, you know why you don't get to bank that?

Why not? Because you get paid $8 million a year. To not. Right. That shoestring catch should be done every single game. You're supposed to be the absolute creme de la creme, and so you're not supposed to make it. I want a bank account.

You want a bank. I want a bank account. The golden rule. Wait, wait, wait, especially since if you make a great play, you might have prevented a run. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Whereas an error might allow to run.

They call it robbing a guy of a home run. There you go. When you catch a ball right when it's about to leave the park. I'm thinking even Steven. That's all. Doesn't work like that. You get the golden rule.

Says the Brit. No, no, no, no. The sort of overarching sporting attitude in the elite sphere is you're only as good as your last game. In this account, scroll that down to, you're only as good as your last play. In this account, scroll that down to, you're only as good as your last play. So whatever you did in the past, baby, history.

We're living in the now. You can take nothing for what you did before because every time you step out across that white line, you have to reprove your reputation. You have to improve, reprove, deliver. So there's no way you're getting slack. Oh, that's a new one. That's a new one.

I like it. I like it. That's the Janet Jackson, what have you done for me lately. Lately. That's true. I like it. I like it. All right.

It's Jackson if you're nasty. All right. All right. So we're almost out of time. We're at the end. So anything else? Can we go back? Can we go back?

Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back?

Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back? Can we go back?

Can we go back? I was thinking of tweeting this, but it required more thought than I was able to give it. And so I haven't tweeted this yet. All right. What was the question now? Okay. Spoiler. Okay.

If you're an outfielder. Okay. And you always make the highlight reel for extraordinary catches. Okay. Does that just mean you're slow? Yeah. I understand that. Okay.

Okay, because here's the deal. Okay. Let me see if I'm following you. I'm with you on this one. You're with me? I get you. So let me see if I'm following you correctly. So here's the deal.

Ball is hit hard to right field. Right center. Right center. Right center. That's even better. Hard to right center, okay? And I take off. You're the right fielder. And I. Right center. Right center. That's even better. Hard to right center. Okay? And I take off.

You're the right fielder. And I'm the right fielder. And I'm running. I'm haul assing. And then all of a sudden, I lay myself out and I snag it. I hit the ground.

I bounce. I come up and I hold it up and I'm like, yes! And everybody's like, ah! Now, same play.

Now, I'm the center fielder. Now I'm the center fielder. Now you're center fielder. Hard right. I am fast as I don't know what. I get there and wait for the ball. Pop fly. Pop fly. Pop fly. Why? Because I'm fast. Because you fast. So the slow dude always looks like he's doing something special. Really?

Here's what complicates it. I like it. Okay, so you're Really? Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, fast. No, we know in advance that he is slow. That's all I'm saying. We know he's slow. And that's why he always looks like he's making a great play. Here's what complicates it to your point. Oh, no, so here we go, yes. Master Brit fellow.

Okay? To your point. Why do I think that's not good for me? No, no, no. It's all said with affection. Okay. Here's what I think you're trying to say with affection. Okay. Here's. They are our closest ally. Here's what I think you're trying to say.

Yes. Okay. That the slow person has a smaller circumference, a smaller perimeter in which he can make the play because he doesn't run very far between the sight of the hit ball and when the ball gets out there. There's another point. Whereas the fast person covers a wider area of the outfield.

So their perimeter is much wider. Much wider, yes. And so their coastline gives them more opportunity to make a spectacular. That's all, go ahead, I'm sorry. In defense of the guy who's towing a trailer, right? A good pro. Slow people, yes. That's it, right?

So a good pro knows their limitations. So if the guy's really fast, his limitations, as you've highlighted, are that much bigger. Now the guy who doesn't have the foot speed. They have lower limitations. No, in terms of the space they can cover. So the guy who's got less speed knows he's got less speed, yet he's been in the majors X amount of years,

possibly 10 years. There's a reason why. What doesn't happen down at his feet happens between his ears. He will now know the pitch, the batter, the way, the series. So you're saying he's the smarter player. He has to be smarter. He will be moving.

Or he just could be lucky and be on teams where there's a center fielder who's like, I got it. I got it. It's not all about speed sometimes. The intelligence and experience of a player will make him naturally move before and position himself to compensate for the lack of speed, which is why the guy's been an all-star five out of ten years that he's been in the major leagues.

He doesn't have the foot speed, but he's got something going on upstairs. Now, that's another side of the coin you might or might not wish to consider. Well, for the purposes of this tweet, that guy doesn't exist. of this tweet, that guy doesn't exist. I would say there's no amount of intelligence that will compensate for not being fast. Oh, no, no, no. Don't get me wrong.

Oh, my God. That is so funny. I'm not just saying. I'm not saying, guys, you wouldn't want a team full of Olympic sprinters that could do the job, but the guys don't all have the same foot speed, so the guys that can exist without the foot speed, they've got something else going up there. They know.

They're reading. They are ahead of the play. Well, I got to tell you something. What you just said about there's no amount of intelligence that can compensate. All right. Just very quickly. A long time ago when I was in corporate America. It's a head-on speed thing.

That's what I'm saying. We did this team building exercise where you go away for a weekend. You were once in corporate America. Yes, I was. Please, let's not go there. Let the record show. Anyway, part of the seminar, the guy, when it comes to putting together a team, he says to everybody, so when you're putting together a team, let's say we're putting together a football team, what would you want? Would you rather have a guy who is the fastest, the most incredible physical specimen ever, but maybe he's not that bright? Or would you rather have a guy like Rudy? Remember the movie Rudy? A guy who will give it 150%, even though that's impossible, but he would do it every single time. He'll give you 150%. He's completely dedicated.

Rudy the benchwarmer guy who got to play. He's like, what guy would you want on your team? And so a bunch of people put up their hands and said, I want Rudy. Because that guy's like, you know, he's got grit. And I went, give me the stupid fast dude. And he said, absolutely. You want the stupid fast guy. Because there's no accounting for that.

You cannot make that up. Right. Yeah. I'm just going to teach him to catch. He can do the rest. There you go. All right. There you go. Talking about super intelligence, we can only add to that sentence, Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Neil, thanks, man. Thank you. So should I tweet that, the outfielder thing? I like the outfielder thing. I like it. Somehow, I still don't feel I'm coming out well out of this. Right. On that point, let's say goodbye.

Thank you once again for being our guests here on Playing With Science. I'm Gary O'Reilly. And I'm Chuck Nice. You've had the pleasure of Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson. And we look forward to your company. It's an honor and a pleasure to serve you. Thank you, sir. Thank you kindly.

And more tweets, I'm sure, from Neil in the future. Stay tuned. We look forward Seth. Thank you kindly. And more tweets, I'm sure, from Neil in the future. Stay tuned. We look forward to your company next time.