StarTalk Radio - NASA and Nichelle Nichols

Episode Date: March 28, 2013

Famous for her role as Star Trek's Uhura, Nichelle Nichols discusses in part 2 of her interview how she also played a vital role in influencing the modern era of NASA. Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ on Apple Podcasts to listen to new episodes ad-free and a whole week early.

Welcome to StarTalk, your place in the universe where science and pop culture collide. StarTalk begins right now. Welcome to StarTalk Radio. I'm Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist, and I also serve as the director of New York City's Hayden Planetarium. And I want to welcome my co-host, Leanne Lord. Star Trek geek babe, is that accurate? Yes, absolutely. I wear my Star Trek fandom proudly on my sleeve.

Well, what we're doing this week is coming up on the part two of my two-part interview with Nichelle Nichols. She, of course, is Lieutenant Uhura of the original Star Trek series and from the Star Trek films. She was an actress, a dancer, you might not have known that, also a singer, and perhaps her most groundbreaking... What does she mean to you? Because she was groundbreaking for a lot of reasons.

Oh, no, absolutely, absolutely. I mean, well, first of all, let's be clear. Lieutenant Uhura on the bridge, slamming outfit, love the boots, but was also fourth in command. Fourth in command. There it is. You know, so if we're talking about, you know, if something happens to the captain and the first officer and then whoever that third guy was, whoever it was wasn't wearing red. We know that.

You know, we jumped to Lieutenant Uhura, who's going to now command the Enterprise. Oh, my God. Okay, so it's one thing to be groundbreaking just in your very presence on a show. But we learned, I learned in my interview, that, in fact, she's had a major force on American culture. Absolutely. Beyond just the fact that she was on that show. And so we're going to rejoin that interview, shown in its entirety, entering now part two of my conversation with Nichelle Nichols held in my office at the Hayden Planetarium one week before the launch of the space shuttle mission.

And this entire interview we're about to hear is it turns on an axis that is NASA. Let's pick it up. I would not have been involved in the space program, actually, if it hadn't been for Laurie. Laurie Garber was involved with the unification of the National Space Organization. Oh, the National Space Society and the L5 Society. L5 Society becoming one. They called and asked me if I would come as their guest and serve on the board of directors of the new founded place. I said I would be honored.

They flew me out. Then they said, would you speak on it? So I write a short speech called Space What's In It For Me. Good title. I kind of took NASA to task for not reaching out to women and people of color that you are losing maybe the next Einstein. The next day I'm asked if I would come to NASA headquarters and meet with John Yardley, who is head of astronauts countrywide. And I got so nervous. I said, oh, what do they want to know put me under the jail what did you do something bad yeah i did something bad and it turned out

they wanted to know if i would assist them in this next recruitment that they were having problems because women and people of color were not applying. They were staying away in droves. And I sat there and looked at them and said, why are you surprised? And the head of NASA, administrative NASA, was Bob Fletcher. And he was kind of a tall, dignified, stiff man. And what I didn't know is he had entered the room. and what I didn't know is he had entered the room. And we had this little tete-a-tete back and forth of,

I can't do this, people will laugh at me and laugh at NASA and hold me responsible for being another dupe of NASA's. And he says, not if they hear you speak five minutes. And I said, how do you know? He says, we were in the audience. And that's when I realized that Fletcher is standing there. Finally, to make a long story short, I said, I will help you, but I am going to get you the most qualified people of anybody you've ever had. And therefore, I don't want to hear any more excuses because they are going to ply in droves. I took the contract. I said, and it has to be a contract

under my company. And he said, what is your company? It's called Women in Motion, and we mean business. And he said, fine. They made a contract. And space is all about being in motion. Exactly. My company was about young people and their education. And exactly what they were talking about is for science and technology and where this takes us because the space is our future and we have to get in, sit in, fit in as best we can, and force ourselves in there, but you've got to be prepared. So I've been doing this, and so laughingly but meaning it, I said, and I'll bring you all these people, and if there's not one woman and one person of color,

I'll be the worst person you ever... I'll be your worst nightmare. I'll be your worst nightmare. And I said, and I intend to speak before Congress in order to get this done. And I will return to Congress if this is not done because... You want to spook NASA, you tell them you're going to say something in front of Congress. I see. Well, I didn't know that then. And you know what happened? John Yardley stood up, put his hand across the table to shake my hand,

and that's the first time I knew Dr. Fletcher was in there, and he walked over and put his hand on top. And I thought, oh, my God, now what am I going to do, Mama? As they say, you were the cat chasing the bus and you caught the bus. Now what are you going to do with the bus? Exactly. Ride it all the way to freedom. And the moment I put out the fact of what I was doing,

everybody on television, I took Good Morning America down to the Cape, which they'd been trying to do. And I just said, I'd like to take Good Morning America. And they said, oh, of course. I called Good Morning America and said, are you sure you know what you're talking about? And I said, call NASA. Call this person. I did so much that I think they had less than 100 people of color when I started, less than a thousand of women. And no one was qualified in the areas they were told they wanted to go and write,

they wanted to have the experience, they wanted to, you know, teachers and so forth like that. But I went after PhDs. I went after those in space science. NORAD invited me. I went to the Pentagon and talked. And when I was at the Pentagon, they wanted me to know that they didn't want me on military bases. However, I did talk on radio and television that anyone in the military could not only apply within the military,

but they could apply on their own as a citizen outside of the military. One man was listening. His name was Freddie Gregory. He was one of my first recruits. A high-ranking NASA person and an astronaut, shuttle-era astronaut. Absolutely. And he was turned down in the military. He applied outside of the Air Force, and NASA grabbed him like that.

Snatched him up. Yeah. And there's people like Mae Jemison. These are— Ron McNair was in that first group. We lost him in the Challenger accident. In the Challenger, which was a tell. Also, Judy Resnick was in

that group of six women. And four years after that selection, I have a picture that I treasure of Judy pinning me with NASA's highest civilian honor. It could be a public service medal. Public service medal. And so it was really a tragic pain for me for that to happen. For just to lose the Challenger, yeah. But it could have been anyone. And so they weren't just those two. But what was so remarkable is that it changed the face of the astronaut corps. NASA did not look like America until the shuttle program. Exactly. That's very clear. And until that recruitment and these wonderful men in the high-powered positions who promised me that if I got the qualified people, they were determined to change.

Right. So it's not simply that you provide the list. Somebody's got to deliver on the other side. Somebody's got to deliver the promise. And they did. Yes. And so I traveled all over the United States speaking to... What I did was kind of unique, because I didn't know where to go and find them. That's right, because it's audacious saying, I'm going to find him. And they say, now I've got to find him. Right, now I'm going to do that.

And it hit me. They graduate from universities. So I had my office look up the best universities that have strong science programs and would have the kind of people that I'm talking to and go and talk to them to the graduating class. Well, they're only going to be bachelors. Well, what I did was infuse the minds of the possibility. That's half the effort right there, just to even know it's possible. Yes, exactly. And then I talked with the heads of the university about what I was doing, and I asked that they identify their alumni who might be interested. And from there, it just happened like bing, bang, bang.

Well, I don't know how widely known that story is of how crucial you were to the modern look of NASA. I mean, that's extraordinary. I was on an airplane like every day, every other day from one place to another. And the Organization of Chemical Engineers were having their annual conferences, and other scientists were having their annual. I had my office call, and I said, well, we'd love to have her, but we can't afford it. And I said, it's under my contract. So I will be there if you invite me. They were like, yeah, because many of them were Star Trek fans,

and they just wanted to know what I was doing. They became my advocates for what I was advocating. We must change the face. We must, we must find the best. And from there, I found the Ron McNairs and the Freddy Greggers and Guillaume and people that we then directly contacted. And they said, some of them said, you're crazy. And I said, yeah, but it takes somebody crazy to move this. Where would this world be without crazy people?

Exactly. We'd still be in the cave. Einstein was crazy at one point. The one and only nichelle nichols that was the first segment of part two of my interview with lieutenant uhura of the star trek series and what impresses me most about her and about what came out of that interview leanne yes is the force that she could wield from having been an actress on a fictional science show, a science fiction television program. Right.

If we could just put that in a textbook and go, okay, hey, boys and girls, here's what you do with celebrity. We don't all go make sex tapes. We do positive things. And what I love is that she didn't necessarily have a plan. Right. She goes, I'm going to do this. And I go, oh, now I have to figure out how to do this.

But that didn't even daunt her. But it worked because she knew at that time what power over people she had. Otherwise, it'd be really hard to have committed that. Right. It could be egg in your face if it fails. Yes. Or it would have been just a forgotten chapter in the history of NASA. Yes, we don't talk about that.

And so this interview took place one week before the launch of the final shuttle, STS-135. Leanne, I don't know if you knew this, but I tweeted that the movie Space Cowboys, which portrayed a shuttle mission, that was shuttle mission STS-200. Oh, dear. How's that for wishful thinking? Wow. It was so slightly in the future, imagining that the shuttle program would be something eternal. When we come back, more of my exclusive interview with Nichelle Nichols on StarTalk Radio. We're talking Star Trek because we're featuring part two of my exclusive interview with Nichelle Nichols, Lieutenant Uhura of the original Star Trek series. interview with Nichelle Nichols, Lieutenant Uhura of the original Star Trek series.

Influential while she was an actress, being not only female in a position of command, in a position of dignity, where people have to listen to what she tells them, including the captain of the starship, she also was black. And still is. Still is, actually. Female at the time, black at the time. You had no such role models before she came on board. And so her very presence was influential. And in this interview, where we focus on her influence on NASA, we learn that that influence went far beyond just her existence as a character on a TV show.

So did she influence you, Leanne? Completely. I mean, me and my mom used to sit and watch Star Trek together. Well, it couldn't be completely because you're a professional stand-up comedian, and she wasn't. So what do you mean, completely? Okay. All right, fine. I can't sing.

I can't dance. I've never been on Star Trek. Thank you for reminding me of my shortcomings. However, my mom and I used to watch Star Trek together. Of course, I was watching it in the reruns. Because you're so young. Because I'm a fetus. I've seen it on YouTube.

I have no idea what you're talking about now. Just her presence, just pure dignity, like you said, and class. She just radiated that. And she made that sort of presence normal. Do you know what i'm saying so i'm in that odd generation where i didn't necessarily always see black actresses as maids so she was one of the first people i saw oh that well that's what we do any brilliant actor makes something extraordinary seem like it it flows like the breeze so she she not only influenced you and your sense of self she also influenced the person who would become an astronaut and who happens today to be the head of NASA, General Charlie Bolden.

Let's pick up my interview from my office at the Hayden Planetarium one week before the launch of the last shuttle mission and find out her influence on the current head of NASA. I heard that the head of NASA became an astronaut because of you. Is that true? Oh, my goodness. That's one of the great rewards of my life. General Charlie Bolden. Charlie Bolden, the current head of NASA. The head of administrative NASA told me that when I was recruiting the first women and minority astronauts

for the space shuttle program for NASA, he heard me on the radio and on television, and he was inspired to apply. He kept up with everything I was doing regarding the astronaut application program, and he decided at the last minute to wait for the next. The next astronaut class? For the next applications. And mine was so successful that he said,

I'm going to apply the next one, which came up pretty soon. And when he applied, there wasn't any question. They just snapped him up like that. At one time, he called me. He says, so I look at Nichelle as my mentor. And I thought that was just the most rewarding and beautiful things anyone had said to me. And that's just as astronaut. Then he becomes head of NASA. That's just as astronaut. That's a lowly astronaut. And listen to this. I didn't even know back then that I had influenced him. And so now he becomes head of NASA. And I'm being honored by the California Space Society. And so I had a table to invite friends. Unbeknowing that they'd been trying to get him, I picked up the telephone, dialed 202 to NASA and asked to speak to Charlie Bolden and ask him if he would be my guest, in which I was being honored for my works.

It was after that that I learned the story that I just told you. That's incredible because you're calling him up. Yes. And he's only there because of you. No, don't give me that much credit. But he's there because he's so dedicated. Well, that's an easy way to get to the head of an agency. Yes.

So I like to speak to the head of the agency. And he's only there because I put him there. But I didn't know that then. I didn't know until he later told me. He didn't even tell me when I finally talked to him. He wasn't there. But I was just amazed. A day later, he called me about 6 o'clock in the evening.

He says, Ms. Nichols, it's Charlie Bolden. And I'm going, Charlie? He's to me, General Charles. General Bolden. And I said, oh, oh, oh, yes. And then he told me the story. And he said. If you're accustomed to calling someone General Bolden, Charlie just doesn't cut it.

Charlie just doesn't. It took me forever to call him Charlie. I still refer to him sometime as Mr. Administrator. But he told me, I tell you what, on the date that you're there, I'm in China. And so I cannot be there. But what I'm thinking is that Laurie Garber and I will make a tape in honor of you. And they made this incredible tape with the two of them standing side by side, and it was very serious and honoring me, and they had the work that I had done

in recruiting the first women and minority astronauts for the space shuttle program, and how proud they were to know me, and so forth. And then just at the end, and I'm standing there about to go on, and nobody told me it was there and they played this tape and tears are coming down my eyes and two people so important to me and just at the end they turned and because I told you this was very serious dedication to me right they turned to the camera and said, with the Star Trek sign of live long and prosper, and said, and with this little smirk on their face, and live long and prosper, Michelle, with their hands. There it is. And the audience just collapsed. Now I've got to go on stage and thank you. I've been thinking for a long time, and I shared it with Charlie Bolden a few months ago, and it was so extemporaneous. It came out of my

mouth before I knew it was coming out, and we were having a meeting in his office in D.C. meeting in his office in D.C. I said, I've decided to form a foundation, the Nichelle Nichols Youth Foundation, for the advancement of the studies of science, technology. The STEM field. Science, technology. Engineering, mathematics. Engineering and mathematics, as our president has put out. And I found myself saying, and I didn't even know I was going to do it, and it's attendant performing arts. And suddenly I knew where I came as an entertainer performer

and my interest in science and technology and our future. Who would have thought that one of the greatest forces to operate on NASA as an agency would be someone with formal training in the performing arts? You can't even script that. My place in the performing arts has matched me with my interest in space and space science and what it means and where we're going. It is our future. It is or it isn't, but it is somebody's.

It is. Somebody thought that that's a future we can go to. And someone has to do each time along the way, if it looks like it's fading, someone's got to do something. That's why I bore Dawson is in this traveling space museum where he takes space memorabilia and rebuilds it to a fifth of the scale. And young children can come in schools, not look at it like a museum where you have to stand behind the bars and somebody explains to you what this one is. Look but don't touch. They have hands-on experience.

And it has changed so many young people's lives. And that's why I've been so proud to work with him. So you're still at it, basically. So you've got the Youth Foundation. You've got the Traveling Space Museum. The other thing that is so powerfully engrossing for me is the power of Gene Roddenberry's dream that has taken millions dedicated to being what is euphemistically known as fandom, but is really a movement of people who believe in everything that I have now covered. The fan base created by Gene Roddenberry. You're one of those fans, Leigh-Anne.

I am. I am. I'm in the legacy. I'm Star Trek. I'm Next Gen. I'm DS9. I'm Voyager. I'm, yeah.

And it's not just simply that there's storytelling in space. There are deep sort of, dare I say, mission statements that reveal themselves. My favorite is, I've heard Nichelle Nichols say it before, every episode of Star Trek, no matter how fun or serious, you part the curtains and there behind it is a deep sense of morality about how we should treat each other and how we should conduct ourselves. I've heard her say in the past that Gene Roddenberry was writing morality plays. Every episode? Every episode.

You walked away, you learned something. One of my favorite episodes was with the kids and there was this entity sort of controlling them. And his thing that he kept saying is, as you believe, so shall you do. And I walked away from it like, oh, wow, that's kind of new age-y. Before new age was a thing. Right, exactly.

It was the space age. The space age. So Nichelle Nichols, of course, is extremely popular in all of the Star Trek conventions. And it's these conventions that kicked in after the original Star Trek had gone off the air that sustained a buoyant force of public interest. We've got to take a quick break, but more StarTalk Radio. I'm here with my co-host, Leanne Lord, talking about Star Trek and Nichelle Nichols

who played Lieutenant Uhura in the original series. So Nichelle not only played her role with dignity and poise she that fact was was was recognized by society all around us and it that's that influence continued way beyond the show, right up into modern day. And in my next clip, we find out she's at Kennedy Center. Yes. And you don't go there unless people are like... Yeah, that's big time. That's big time.

Let's find out all about the Kennedy Center. I was honored to partake in a major NASA salute to the history of space at the Kennedy Center. Kennedy Center in Washington. In Washington, D.C. And they asked me to sing the Star Trek theme. Oh, my goodness. Yes. And then later they said, we'd like one more thing that you do, which you do the captain's log.

And then come out and sing to a 25-piece symphony orchestra conducted by Emile Ducou. And I was so honored that I started shivering. And I was so honored that I started shivering. And then they came and said, oh, we'd like to add one more thing. I said, oh, what? Well, we want when you come out to sing, there will be a stool that they will bring to you when you finish singing. And we would like Emil to interview you. So they didn't announce me. I was in the brochure, but they didn't announce me and they had me to begin Space, the Final Frontier.

Off stage, on mic, right? And then I walked out. The light picked me up with a Marine on the arm of a Marine escorting me out. And when I hit that light, it was a bold lego where no woman or man has gone before. That audience went insane. They just jumped up screaming, which shook me. I'm going, wait, what? What did I do wrong? What did I miss?

What did I miss? Did something happen I didn't know about? Well, what I missed was the first four bars of the song because they were screaming. And so I just started going, picked up in the middle, and went, oh. Then I came in on the final eight bars. And then you go back to, oh. I'm cracking up. There's a needle on my microphone again.

Microphone, did you catch those notes? Because I don't know if you did. But they came out perfectly, did they not? And I suddenly was, the moment I got over the audience screaming, when I walked out, they were screaming and stood applauding so much I couldn't hear the symphony orchestra. Got in place. That's how you know you're bringing down the house. You can't even hear the monitored speakers or anything, right? Because they didn't know who was speaking until I walked out. And then we did this interview and I started talking extemporaneously and

realized that about a dozen people in that audience were responsible for everything I've talked to you about my participation in the space program. And I became very calm. I talked about everything from Laurie Garver, who invited me to be part of the new organization and board of governors of the National Space Society. To Gregory. Fred Gregory. Fred Gregory. To Jesko von Puttkama. Jesko von Puttkama, who is head now of the Astronauts in Space.

He introduced me to NASA, to the administrator of NASA. There were about a half dozen people in the audience. And the Traveling Space Museum, Ivor Dawson, who's sitting next to Jessica von Puttkama just by accident. It's like the episode, This Is Your Life. This Is My Life. And they're all sitting out there who've charged my life. And I'm singing a song that Gene Roddenberry wrote the lyrics to.

It was surreal. And it was like a dream. You walk out of a dream and it comes true. And you're waiting for the bubble to bust, but it never did. It never did. Because it was all real. And there were 17. We're in the Kennedy Center.

Do you understand what I'm saying? Kennedy was so important in our lives. One month before Kennedy died, my father died, was assassinated, my father died. My father and Kennedy were the two most important men in my young son's life. We sat up together when he was just barely eight or nine years old, when the first man went to the moon. nine years old, when the first man went to the moon. Kennedy spoke to the highest level of your ambition, of your aspirations in life for this planet. 17 of the surviving Kennedys were in the audience and came back to the green room to meet me before and after the show. And they were trekkers.

I mean, and then after the show, they were like speechless coming. And some just touched me and said, thank you. It was like you write a novel and put yourself in it. And all your dreams come true in this novel. Allow me to clarify something. Yes. There are famous people who could get any kind of reaction out of a fan base. The reaction that fan base was giving you wasn't simply because you were famous,

but because you influenced them. That's a different kind of fame. Yes. That's a fame where people's lives are changed because you were born into this world. Yes. Whereas any number of famous people, my life would be no different if they came or went, even though we can all recite their name and we know where they live and you know, their family. There's a difference there. And so

yeah, maybe a novel you could write and put yourself in it. But in fact, it's not your novel. It's everybody else's novel that you empowered. Because I couldn't make this up. I think I'm a pretty good writer, but I couldn't make this up. You've been listening to StarTalk Radio and my interview with Nichelle Nichols,

Lieutenant Uhura of Star Trek fame. Just learning what else happened in her life after the original seasons of Star Trek were canceled. The show went away. It was resurrected a couple of decades later. It became a new TV series. It became a movie and more series followed it. And its influences continued to be felt this day. So Leanne, my co-host here, a Trekker herself.

Yes, I am unabashed. So this vision of the future that Star Trek has portrayed, I think it gives us all hope, right? It does. I mean, for me, it's a very hopeful series, you know, that we are somehow risen above the squabbles that Earth is mired in now. We're one planet. We're one people. There's no money there. Right, right.

I'm not sure. I have to confess that in the 60s, when I did see the original run of Star Trek, I was a bit distracted by how many alien females Captain Kirk would say, oh, that is a kiss. What is kiss? Oh, that's an Earth emotion that we express with each other. So Kirk was getting it. Kirk and the green chicks. The green babes. Apparently, that's the key to Star Trek happiness in the future. That's the subtext.

I was a little distracted by his love life. Right. His intergalactic love life. But behind all of that, clearly, there were messages. No pun intended. Messages. I'm sorry. That's okay. She's a professional stand-up comedian.

Don't try this at home, kids. She's allowed. So the vision for the future, it was hopeful, in spite of the fact that there were enemies and things. Yeah. We're going to work this out. We're going to work it out diplomatically. We're not going to just go to phasers right away. You can set the phaser on stun.

You can set it on stun. Our guns we have today can't do that. No, no. Where's that technology? I guess it's called the taser. The taser. That's right. Yeah.

Wow. We've got to take a quick break, but more StarTalk Radio. Welcome back. We're talking about Star Trek because we're about to hear the last segment of part two of my two-hour interview with Nichelle Nichols, an exclusive interview in my office. I'm happy to say she was in my office. Yes, yes. I felt like I was in the presence of royalty, by the way. And you were, sir.

Oh, my goodness. Let's pick that up as we chat about, she's on her way to Florida to view the launch of STS-135, the last of the space shuttle mission. So you know of the space shuttles that are going to different cities, New York City is getting the Enterprise, the very first prototype space shuttle. Yes. And there was some angst. That was named after the first. Named after Star Trek.

And I didn't want it to be that first one because I knew the first one was going to be a prototype and was never going to fly. Well, it would never go into orbit, for sure. a prototype and was never going to fly. Well, it would never go into orbit, for sure. However, however, what's different about the space shuttle is that it can land like an airplane, and that's what it tested. We didn't, I don't need something called Enterprise to test going into orbit. We've been going into orbit since 1962.

Yes. I visited the Intrepid Museum, which is going to get the gift. Yes. And they were worried about it not having gone into orbit. I said you should celebrate the fact, because there can only ever be one prototype. I later, like I said, I wanted it when the president was going to name it the Constitution. I said, good, because the next one would be. And then when he decided once, I started thinking, and just like you, I said, that's good because that one will

never be obsolete. Never. Because it is what it was. It is a prototype. Prototype. And it sets the tone for... Not only that, tragically, the first orbiting space shuttle mission was... We won't talk about that.

I know. Yeah. That was... There's my guys on that. I just... I suffered with that for a long time. Yeah. Columbia was not coming back, and that was STS-1.

Yes. I'm so proud to say that next week I'm flying out as NASA's guest. To the launch of STS-135. For the final launch. To the launch of STS-135. For the final launch. And I wouldn't want to be anywhere else, but I will be taking part in the festivities and the programs, and I am so honored. Star Trek had the fortunate fact of playing during the Apollo era.

Yes. And so you had an attendant set of news stories reporting on our journeys into space right alongside each episode that aired every week. But I'm not that hopeful for the future of America. I mean, I don't see science being embraced. Today, I just don't feel it from the public. And I see science illiteracy abound. You know, it's one thing to be scientifically illiterate, but it's a worse thing to be illiterate and not know that you're scientifically illiterate,

and you're making decisions that you think are informed but are not. Or you're making decisions for people that you either think are informed or are not informed and don't care. And don't care. It's about power. Power. And so I'd like to think that science fiction can guide that. I'm not worried about the country so much as I'm certainly worried about right now the short-sightedness that's going on.

right now the short-sightedness that's going on. I'm concerned that a man of great mind or potentials, so beautiful that it could have taken us to a higher place than the first black man that sits in the White House, that had dreams beyond dreams, who I really feel only wants to do a majorly good job. In mistakes along the way, yes. But I think it's incumbent on us as human beings and part of this race on Earth is to add to the goodness that we've been given on this Earth. Talk about America. this earth talk about uh america whether america survives or falls is america's decision michelle i'm going to hug you on the microphone if i may thank you okay what do hugs sound like let's try that

michelle thanks for being on StarTalk Radio. Thank you so much. Oh, my goodness. That's Michelle Nichols. That's on air. That was an on-air hug. Yes. That's what that was.

And can I just say so that we put it out there now? Hello, my name is Leanne Lord, and I admit that I know that I am scientifically illiterate. That is the first step. That is the first step. The first step towards the deep understanding of how to affect your life. Yes, I know that I don't know a lot of stuff. That's why I'm hanging out with you. So my lament, by the way, is not the end of the shuttle era.

There's everyone going to the final launch, and they're all sad. And I don't lament that. I lament the fact that there's not another vehicle sitting on the adjacent launch pad ready to go when the shuttle ends. Nobody lamented Gemini when Apollo was sitting right next door. No one said, oh, I'm going to miss the little capsule with two people in it because we had something else to embrace that was going places. Let me ask you this. That's my big concern.

What happened to that ambition, though? It's still there a little bit. Here's the problem. In fact, there are monies in place to work on what they call the new generation heavy lift vehicle that will get people back to work. Heavy things like cargo, people, crew. And Americans who have gained weight. Yes.

Yes. That was the subtext. Got it. Is that why they're calling it the heavy lift? Yes. Because we're not going to lose weight. They didn't call it heavy lift before. They didn't need to.

So they are working on it. However, the delivery of this product and the destinations it will go and for which they have been set for it will fall outside of the watch of our current president, even if he serves two terms. So we live in an era where a president can end up promising something and then be on the beaches in the Bahamas when it's time to actually make the thing happen. So you think he should have sped that timetable up? That's what Kennedy did. Kennedy said, we're going to go to the moon before the decade is out. And if he were a two-term president, it would have happened under his watch. And so... But that comes back to ambition.

What happened to that? What happened to, listen, we're going to get this done. We're going to get this done by Tuesday. Exactly. And under 140 characters. I mean, where was that ambition? We need, that's what we need. I want it done. I want it done was that ambition? That's what we need. I want it done.

I want it done yesterday. And I want it done on budget. And I want it done in 140 characters. I didn't say on budget. I didn't throw that in there. This has been StarTalk Radio. And I want to thank my guest. And as always, I bid you to keep looking up.