StarTalk Radio - Season 5 Time Capsule (Part 1)

Episode Date: December 28, 2014

As Season 5 draws to a close, join astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson in looking back at the brightest moments of a year brimming with science, comedy, urban legends, the COSMOS and even God. 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 host. I'm an astrophysicist and director of New York City's Hayden Planetarium. The following show is our annual Time Capsule, a collection from our fifth season, selected by you, our audience, as your favorite shows of the year. First up, a conversation with the one and only Seth MacFarlane. In addition to being the writer and director of the hit TV series Family Guy and of the movie Ted, he was an executive

producer for Cosmos, A Spacetime Odyssey, the continuation of the movie, Ted, he was an executive producer for Cosmos, a space-time odyssey. The continuation of the original journey begun by Carl Sagan back in 1980, and which I had the privilege of hosting this time around. Do you remember when we met? It was at that seafood...

Well, we met at the... That's where we discussed Cosmos. But we met... At the Science and Entertainment Exchange. Now, evidence that there's a science thread running through Family Guy is that you're like a founding advisor to the Science and Entertainment Exchange. This is crazy. No, I mean, it's crazy good. It's an honorary title of sorts.

But you have to have some energy to try to join the two. Yeah, I love the idea because, you know, well, first of all, everyone in Hollywood is also very interested in science. These are people who are educated and they're creative by nature, curious by nature, and they want to know. They don't want to settle for what the most comfortable illusion is. They want to know what science can tell them. So you and some of your pals, who else is in this? Well, Jerry and Janet Zucker founded it. Okay, Jerry Zucker of Airplane.

Airplane, Naked Gun. Naked Gun, that whole series. Top Secret. So it's a way for writers, producers, creative Hollywood. To connect with scientists. To connect with scientists. And it's a branch of the National Academy of Sciences. Yeah, and I think the thinking was that, well, look, Hollywood wants to get its science right because it just makes us look like we've done our homework.

And it's in the interest of the scientific community because the entertainment industry is so widespread. And when they see a forensic show or a space show or a medical show or a show that deals with any branch of science, audiences assume that we've all done our homework, and we almost never have. Unless you have a science consultant on staff. We've almost never done our homework. Look at the success of the sitcom, The Big Bang Theory. They have a physicist on staff

who changes the whiteboards every day with a new equation relevant to what's going on in that show. And then it gets talked about in the blogosphere. So it's a very rich thing. To my surprise, after we have lunch one day, all you did was ask me questions about

the Big Bang and the early universe. So I said, yeah, this guy's like, he's all there. Yeah, yeah. And then nothing else was spoken. And you walked away into the mist. And eight months later, six months later, Stewie visits the Big Bang in his time machine. Now, I didn't see that episode when it aired, but my cell phone started lighting up. There it was, a full screen credit.

Neil deGrasse Tyson, science consultant. I'm trying to remember, did we ask you if we could do that? No, not at all. We were just being extraordinarily presumptuous, trying to legitimize ourselves. This will get the critics on our side, damn it all. But how many cartoons get to cite Science Consultant? Exactly.

No, it was good. I recommend anybody. You can probably get it on Netflix or wherever. It's the episode called The Big Bang Theory. Stewie uses his time machine to go back to the Big Bang, and he's outside of the space-time continuum with Brian. It was brilliant. It was brilliant.

Not just because I inadvertently advised on it, but I think it was very well done. In my world, everybody's favorite scene in Family Guy is when Peter wants to become a redneck. Oh, yeah. And take on the culture. Yeah. He gets the hat, gets the boots, they move south, and he turns on the TV. Cosmos.

Tell me what went through your head there. What is that? It's an illustration of the modern day clash between science and religion. And I don't remember who wrote that gag, but it was in one of our cutaway rooms. We have these satellite rooms that go off the main room, and they come back with a series of gags, and we'll pick the best one. So, you know, I'm not the only Cosmos fan on that staff. I did do the voice of Carl Sagan, though.

Let me hear something, Carl. It's just a slightly altered Kermit the Frog. I feel terrible. He's one of my heroes. But it was, he had a very distinctive voice. Yeah, yeah. And so in that scene, in case you hadn't seen it, there's Carl Sagan delivering some lines from the original Cosmos,

and it's edited. And Peter says, honey, look, it's Cosmos edited for Red Max. And he says, in the beginning, there was the big man. God. Yeah, I think they're going to stretch in the beginning, there was the big man. God. Yeah, I think they're going to stretch it all out because that's the only... And the universe is 13 billion 6,000.

You know, it's interesting, and I do try, and I know you do as well, to try to talk about that without succumbing to the temptation to say, come on, there's just no evidence. I mean, the Earth cannot be 6,000 years old. It just can't. I mean, it's not a matter of your beliefs versus my beliefs. It just can't. But there aren't many cartoons that address this. That's my point. So I tip my hat to you. Our live shows are always extremely popular, and this year proved no exception. You selected

Big Brains at BAM as one of the top picks of the season. Recorded live at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, my co-host Eugene Merman and I were joined on stage that night by, just get this list, Bill Nye the Science Guy, neuroscientist Dr. Heather Boleyn, the actor Paul Rudd,

comedian Michael Ian Black, and the star of the TV hit series Big Bang Theory, Mayim Bialik. B.F. Skinner's idea was that we're born sort of tabula rasa, blank slate, and you can make anybody into anything just by training, by giving them rewards and punishers and modifying their behavior accordingly. What we know now is that we're born with certain genetic predispositions to behave in certain ways, and then you can modify behavior within a range that you're given biologically. So for even something like intelligence, for example, you can be born with a genetic predisposition to be within a certain, let's say, IQ range. Then your environment can push you sort of towards the top end of that range, or maybe,

you know, towards the low end of that range. Then we're knowing now from mapping out the brain and looking at the genome that what seems to be most affected by the environment is the way the brain is wired. So you're born with certain genetic predisposition most affected by the environment is the way the brain is wired. So you're born with certain genetic predisposition in terms of the structures. Let me just ask you, can you teach someone math faster by giving them candy than just by teaching them? I mean, I'm just wondering, we're holding them underwater and being like, learn it, learn it, and then waterboarding. I guess I'm describing waterboarding. A towel on the face, a little bottle of water, and some napkins. Well, we know that people discount delays with rewards.

So if you give someone, like, a reward right away, they'll put more emphasis, they'll want that rather than waiting for a reward later. Well, I think the issue there is motivation and not necessarily a skill set and a cognitive ability or a technical ability. So the fact is, yes, candy makes everything better no matter what you're trying to learn because it's a very strong motivator and it's a potent motivator.

It might not make you better at math, but it might make you study for longer, for example. What will cocaine do for my math skills? A kid can learn French in a week on heroin. That's a reward. Okay, so a little of both might help, I guess. I mean, this is the gold star that children get in elementary school, right? I mean, it does work to a certain extent. As I said, it'll help motivate behavior, but it won't give you a skill set that you don't have.

Well, and I think also as parents, it's one of the early things we learn when we're talking about how we discipline children and waterboarding, joking aside, threats and fear and punishment and pain are very, very strong motivators to change behavior. The do you want to condition a child with fear is a much larger question, which is probably not funny at all. And I won't go into it. There's positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement. There's also taking away of a positive, which can be another way to help somebody learn. There's a whole variety of ways you can model behavior. I thought about taking away. If someone lives with a positive,

you threaten to take that away. Like a finger. Don't tell me it's not a positive. I don't have a child, so it's fine that I'm saying all this. I have two children, and it's fine that you're saying this. You see certain populations, like people from the Dominican Republic, which is such a small country, but have a large portion of people entering the major leagues of baseball.

Is it because they have peers? This is such a dangerous question we know you're about to ask. It's so dangerous. I was not going into racism, although I will if you want me to. No, it was about something somebody else asked about observing other people in peer groups ascending to higher levels and therefore seeing firsthand what's possible. Does that make you more susceptible to those possibilities? I think that's a huge sociological, environmental, behavioral influence, but I don't know. I know, I'm writing my dissertation on it.

I'm sorry. Have they found a gene for baseball? That's really hard to ask that, right? You're born with certain genetic predispositions towards, you know, maybe better athletic prowess, but it gets dangerous. Different distribution of muscle fibers, for example, in runners. The thing with dancing around is it can be very controversial. There was a book written called The Bell Curve about intelligence, and it said we did this whole study and looked at

populations and X number of people from a certain type of background have the highest IQ and others don't, and it really can lead to... Ashkenazi Jews. It happened to be Ashkenazi Jews, but it was... Who have the highest IQ? I think we... Yeah. Wait, me too, me too. That's right. Another factor as a baseball fan, another very strong motivator in those countries

is you can play baseball all year. I was just in Minneapolis this morning. Very challenging. That's because the snow is white, the ball is white. And then you also have this... Now who's being racist? You also have this extraordinary motivation of money. You can make it in the big leagues.

And have you ever seen the World Baseball Classic? Yeah. It's mostly Latin America. Extraordinary players. Yeah. But it's one more click to hit it. I'd like to change the topic. Let's talk about eugenics for a moment.

Science that first makes you laugh and then makes you think. That's the Ig Nobel Prize in a nutshell. Comedian co-host Leanne Lord and I spoke with the founder of the prize, Mark Abrams, and we learned about some unusual but highly amusing research that scientists have pursued over the years. This report is the first scientifically documented case of homosexual necrophilia in the Mallard Duck. Okay.

My blood just ran cold. Anybody else? Because somebody's watching this. I would be happy to give you more detail. How much more detail does one need than homosexual necrophilia in the Mallard Duck? That title has all the detail you need. Neil, it's seldom a question of need.

It's a matter of desire. Yes, yes. Now it's a car accident. Now I've got to stop and watch. Oh, very interesting analogy. It's rubbernecking on what's going on on the side of the road. I am indulging in my natural human instincts. I am not rising above them at this moment. I need to know about the duck. Okay. So what motivated this research? Well,

first of all... Do you get to know that even? First of all, I should not exactly correct, but channel what Leanne just said. You need to know about the duck, you said. There were two ducks involved in this. Yes. Well, the dead one and the live one, I would presume. Yes. Would you like to hear the story? Okay. I have to. I'm sorry, Neil, I have to. The paper was written by a man named Kees Mooliker. He's Dutch. He is the curator of a museum in the city of Rotterdam. It's the Natural History Museum in Rotterdam. A very nice museum. A few years ago, they put up a new wing with all glass walls. And from the very beginning, birds every day slam into that thing.

They don't see it certain times of day, depending on the light. And the people who work there got used to the, they pay very little attention. But one day, Kees Mulliker was sitting there. Wait, wait, wait. So the sound of birds snapping their neck, flying into a window they don't see became the

natural din of sounds in their day. If this happened several hundred times a day where you work, you would get used to it very quickly. No, I would stop it from happening. No, you would adjust. Human it very quickly. No, I would stop it from happening. I'm sorry. No, you would adjust. Human beings adjust to all sorts of things. You would see if you could find a way to stop it.

But back to the case. Yes. One day he was sitting there, Case Mulliker was, and he heard an especially loud, and he was curious. So he went and he looked out the window, and he saw that there was a mallard duck on the ground that pretty clearly had just slammed into the building at very high speed, broken its neck and was dead. While he was watching, a second mallard duck flew in, landed next to the dead one and began engaging in activity with the dead one. Now, Case...

Freshly dead. Yes, freshly dead, if you want to think of it that way. Okay. Case studies birds, and he realized quite quickly that he had never heard of anything quite like this happening. So he decided to, and he did, get his notebook and his camera, and he moved a little closer to that spot. He sat there taking notes while this was happening. As any good scientist would do. Yes, or at least many. And he continued taking notes as this unfolded over the next 75 minutes. So clearly these weren't resuscitation

efforts. Apparently not. Probably not. Mouth to mouth. Scientists from the Czech Republic, Japan, India, and the United States investigated whether it is mentally hazardous for a human being to own a cat. That got an Ig Nobel Award. Oh, yes. That was this year, 2014. 2014. And the prize was split between two different teams, one of them based in Europe, one of them based here and India. The Europe team is really headed by a colorful guy.

You should look this guy up on the Internet. He is the most interesting-looking person you have ever seen. His name is Jaroslav Flegar, F-L-E-G-R. He's from Czechoslovakia. With a name like that, you've got to be interesting looking, right? And he, for 20 or 30 years, has been looking at a particular parasite called toxoplasma that pretty commonly lives in cats. So it's a natural parasite to the cat. Yep.

And it's easily transmitted from cats to people who hang around the cats. Just to be clear, if a cat has this parasite, the cat is not sick. Right. It's just normal for a healthy cat. Right. Okay. Gotcha. Go on. Well, in some cases, and nobody understands why sometimes it goes one way, sometimes the other, that sometimes the cat seems to behave just like a normal cat, but sometimes because it has this parasite, the cat will start behaving in ways that

are very destructive to itself. That are toxoplasmic to itself. Yes. Toxoplasmosis is the disease. And sometimes apparently that happens to humans. And these people are now wondering, well, have been for a while, and other people that you've heard the phrase cat lady of somebody who owns hundreds of cats and behaves in a very, very eccentric way, that maybe a lot of those people are infected with this parasite. Does part of the manifestation of that infection make you want to acquire more cats? Because the old cat lady never has just one cat. Well, no. Well, that's the thinking that probably happens.

So this is a way for the parasite to reproduce itself by getting you to want more cats that contain the parasite. I'll go with it. That's a brilliant parasite. All this time I thought it was the cats that were in charge. It's all about the parasite. And there are other parasites that behave in similar ways in other animals. Okay, so what are some of the disorders? I mean, when I think of a cat lady, they're a little odd,

but they're a lot of odd older people. So I never uniquely implicated the fact that it's a cat lady. It's not always a cat lady. It's not always a lady. Right. Yeah, they're crazy cat dudes. They're a whole range. Wait, wait, wait.

Pause. How many crazy cat dudes do you know? I'm dating. There are lots of crazy cat dudes. They're a whole range. Wait, wait, wait. Pause. How many crazy cat dudes do you know? I'm dating. There are lots of crazy cat dudes out there. Okay, fine. Okay, and you find yourself especially attracted to? No, not at all. Thank you.

Yes. I was going to ask that. What happens is they hide the cat, and then I find out there's a cat. Oh. They hide the cat. Because you don't necessarily, the first date isn't necessarily at their apartment. How does one hide a cat? Well, it doesn't. It's not experience. You don't lead's a cat. Oh. You know, because you don't necessarily, the first date isn't necessarily at their apartment. How does one hide a cat? Well, it doesn't, it's not, you don't lead with the cat.

She doesn't go home with the first date. Right. Every night. And it may not, it's not something they might not lead with. Like, hi, my name is so-and-so. I have a cat. You know, that would be a little off-putting. If you've had so many bad experiences, I would expect that by now you lead with the question.

Hi. Hi, Jay. Do you have a cat? Hi, I find you very attractive. Do you have a cat? Not even, do you have a job? Is your mom crazy? Do you have a cat? Not even do you have a job? Is your mom crazy? Do you have a cat? But I'm looking at these symptoms. You've got obsessive

compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, and that leads me to wonder whether these legends of cat people, these are people with multiple personality disorders. Cat woman. And the Natasha Kinski film, Cat People

I think more than one version of that film the one she's in is the one I remember I wonder why These are people who the cat manifestation interferes with their psychological state. So you think this might go way back. I heard you laugh when you first

brought up this topic and now I hear you asking very good questions thinking about it I'm not crying yet. That's why we gave a cry. I'll be crying soon when we're done. Welcome back to StarTalk Radio. I'm Neil deGrasse Tyson. In this time capsule show, we're featuring fan favorites from season five. Next up, a conversation with Ann Druyan, the co-creator, writer, director, and a producer of Cosmos, a Spacetime Odyssey. She also was one of the original writers of the original Cosmos with Carl Sagan. Hyperliterate people often, to my disappointment, say, well, I was never good at

science. I was never good at math. And use that as a reason to not learn more. And clearly that wasn't the case with you. So what happened there? Okay, so as a child of the 60s, I was hungry for a way to understand the world that could cut through deceit and lies. And, you know, if you think of the 60s as a moment when the great middle, including me, of the American people, began to realize that they couldn't trust the government. After years of, you know, during the Second World War, it was total faith and credit. The government was beyond reproach. And in the 60s, this edifice starts to crumble.

And so... For the first time, right? In America. See, I don't know what was happening 100 years before, but certainly in modern history. And so I was hungry for a way to know what's real. And I looked everywhere and I found it in the pre-Socratic philosophers, the ancient Greeks who invented science. And I suddenly realized, oh, Jesus, I was such an idiot. I didn't really pay attention in science when it has this error correcting mechanism that nothing else has. And so that's what attracted me to science. The urge to know the truth in anything. Nothing absolute, but just give me some truth, as John Lennon famously said. We spend 13 episodes teaching you about the universe and why it matters and what it feels

like and what it means. And then you give us a little space at the end to emote. Yeah, exactly. By the way, there's some passages I couldn't keep a dry eye while I was reading them. I know. I was choking up. Every time I would be sitting in the editing room, and the editors, too, and the assistant editors. And this is a place where you hear the same damn passage a hundred times in a row. A hundred times. People start welling up.

Someone asks someone a question. There's no answer. Well, the guy's sitting in there in the dark with you. What's up? And didn't you hear me? And it's like, I can't talk. I'm just going to cry. So I feel like the case for science, which was at the nucleus of the dream of Cosmos is being made. And finally, we get to tie it all together

with your amazing performance and the astonishing visual effects and the script. You know, what really gets me and why we all cried, like 30 of us in the screening room who had worked on it for years, was when you let that ship go and the chair is empty. People in 180 countries around the world have seen this case for science, have seen

what we have to show about the universe. The dream that all of us could be changed sufficiently so that we could awaken from our stupor and act in defense of the planet and science and demand our governments to be more scientifically aware of the needs and challenges of our planet, but also of the promise of the cosmos. Show me your file cabinet in your home. Just stories in progress that are not yet realized. Yes, I'm so thrilled. I mean, if you see Jan Oort and Edmund Halley trending in the top three subjects on Twitter, you know that you have struck a chord. And there are so many other stories.

I mean, why not make heroes of the people who brought us knowledge instead of heroes of the people who have the best stylists or the people who spend the most money or the people who drive the fanciest car yeah why i mean do we want our kids to be scientists or we want them to be clothes hangers that's the question we've had a lot of amazing guests on star talk over the years but this season we got the ultimate interview with god yeah Yeah, you heard me, God. I first ran across God through his The Tweet of God postings on Twitter. And although he's a very busy entity,

he spared an hour of his time to answer some of my burning questions about life and everything else under the sun and in the universe. When were you born and where were you born? I was born an infinite number of years ago. It was October 8th, negative infinity. Born to whom? I was my own father and then I never knew my mom. She left me when I was about 87 trillion, so I was still very young. And has that scarred me? Some have argued it has, and perhaps it has. I don't really know. But I learned very early on that anything I was going to have in this existence, I would have to create for myself. And so that's what gave me the idea to create the universe.

Because I thought if I create the universe, I'll have something that I can call my own. And I think that was important to me. That was a turning point in terms of my own self-esteem. Our best thinking today about the universe tells us that maybe this is not the only universe. That there could be a multiverse, an infinitude of other universes out there. Yet I've got you sitting next to me in a StarTalk interview in this universe. Do the other universes have their own gods?

No, I am the god of all the other universes. Now, how do you even know that? Oh, sorry, your god. Sorry. There are six different other universes. There are six universes total. But it's not infinite. No, it's just six. The only difference is which of the characters from Friends goes on to be the biggest star after the show.

Everything else is exactly the same, but in one universe, Lisa Kudrow is the big star. In one, David Schwimmer is the biggest star. In another one, Jennifer Addison is the biggest. So those are the only six universes that there are. How about the laws of physics within those universes? Oh, same, same. Same? Yeah.

That's no fun. I settled on these constants for a good reason. Every mathematical constant in the universe is there for a good reason. Because we're at the speed of light. That's a good one. That one is same everywhere. We've got Planck's constant, the gravitational constant. Yes.

Why not experiment with some more? I'm very happy with those. By the way, it's not just mathematical constants. There's also other, well, Murphy's law. That's a constant. That's a constant as much as any of the ones you mentioned. Anything that can go wrong, well, that is a universal law. What's with the commandments? Why are there only 10? I keep thinking we need more instructions than that. There should only be one commandment, really. are there only ten? I keep thinking we need more instructions than that. There should only be one commandment, really. And the only commandment that was necessary, and I realize it's too late, is just quit being a dick. That's the one commandment that's

really the only essential one for life. Just quit being a dick. And looking back, that's the one I would have. And that covers all of them. That covers all of them in its way. I believe, when loosely interpreted, the quit being a dick rule will cover any moral situation.

In this live show recorded at Sketchfest in San Francisco, Bill Nye the Science Guy sits in for me, along with co-host Eugene Merman and comedian Dave Foley, where they talk about the possibilities of alien life with SETI astronomer Seth Shostak. Astronomers have been looking at the heavens for a long time. You guys have been looking at the heavens for 60 years. Is that accurate? 50-something years. And you haven't heard a thing. And this gets

back to Fermi's paradox. If they're out there, why haven't you heard from them? Well, I don't know if everybody in the audience knows Fermi's paradox, unless they're related to the guy. But Fermi was having lunch with a couple of physicists, and at some point, between two bites of a tuna fish sandwich, he says,

so where is everybody? He wasn't referring to the lack of company at the lunch. What he was referring to was the fact that the time that it would take to colonize the galaxy, if that's on your agenda, if you're the Klingons and you decide you want to colonize the galaxy, and even if your rockets aren't all that fast, but if you stay at it, you can do it in a few tens of millions of years, maybe 30, 40, 50 million years.

It's like that. Yeah, that's a long time. Yeah, that's a long time if you're waiting for a bus in San Francisco. But that's not very long compared to the age of the galaxy. So what he was saying is if there really are advanced societies out there, some of them, one of them,

would have colonized the entire galaxy by now. We see no evidence of that. And that's why I said, so where is everybody? At which point you let the subject drop. And ruined lunch. You guys, it's extraordinary, but it's not crazy

to suggest that life started on Mars when Mars was very wet, and then it got hit with an impactor. I mean, I'm sure it was excited also. You are all a bag of perverts! I didn't know science was so dirty.

Any chance, any tiny... Hey, that's your problem. Yes, I know. Okay, so this thing gets hit with an impactor three billion years ago. The stuff's thrown into space. A few bits of it get in this extraordinary mathematical thing called a home in orbit, yeah?

Except it's in outer space, so it goes... and lands on the Earth. And you and I are somehow descendant from a Martian microbe, and let me just say, do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do, it would be an extraordinary discovery about the course of events. It would really be something. And so along this line, if we are all descendant from a common ancestor, which seems a reasonable conclusion when you look at your DNA

and all those primitive life forms like, anyone? My old boss. Ted Cruz! It is another question, though. Could have life started a second time or the time before us here on Earth? And if we just had the right place to look, we would find the so-called second Genesis. We are

the aliens we're looking for. Boom! Whoa. And that theory is called, what is it called? Second Genesis? No, the theory that life came here from space. Transpermium.

Transpermium. I know. We have modern telescopes. And people look out there and they observe planets. And they can infer from here that these places are probably inhabitable. But what does it take to be habitable? Well, that's actually a good question, because all we know is what it takes for life like our own to be habitable.

So you have to start there because you don't have any other data points. But that means, yeah, maybe something to breathe. But not necessarily. I mean, if you dug a hole one mile deep here, it'd take you all night. But if you did that and you pulled up the muck at the bottom and put it under a microscope, you'd see microbes. That don't need air to breathe. They don't need air. In fact, if you give them air, they're down.

They don't need sunlight, no photosynthesis. I mean, they're alive, but they're down there. So there's no good definition of life, right? You might think of Justice Potter talking about pornography. I'll know it when I see it. Life is kind of the same way, right? It can definitely high-five. I think we can all kind of agree

that it's not life if it can't go, yeah! But what else? Random high-five. And if it leaves you hanging, it is dead to me. Other than, of course, high-fivesives what are some of the what are some of ways that you could categorize something being alive it's it's actually quite hard to do i mean you can say if you pick up

your 10th grade biology book if you still have that and you open it up it starts out with a definition of well life has metabolism and life reproduces homeostasis all this stuff yeah whatever but it you know you can you can think of examples of things that fit the definition but aren't alive, right? There's things like mules. They don't reproduce, it turns out. But you wouldn't, you know, contest the fact that they're alive, right? Fire reproduces, but it's not alive.

So there's no good definition for life. The current working definition, if it evolves in a Darwinian fashion. What? That isn't even true. Probably not. What if it's in a Freudian fashion? Some other fabulous...

It's an experiment to StarTalk Radio. I'm Neil deGrasse Tyson. This time capsule show is a collection of fan favorites from Season 5 and one of your favorite interviews with Cassini imaging scientist Carolyn Porco. She's not only responsible for that mission's stunning images of my favorite planet, Saturn, and its many moons, but she has a compelling life story that resonated with many of you. So how early did you know you wanted to do this? So I got into astronomy the back door.

I was attracted more from my spiritual questioning when I was just a young teenager. I was like 13 going on 80. And I was thinking things like, what am I doing here? What is the meaning of life? You know, I was probably very depressed. That's probably why I was thinking these things. So you had existential angst at age 13? I had enormous existential angst. That is the beginning of a troubled teenage. I know. And I read about Hinduism. I read about Buddhism. I read about... So you were totally messed up. I was totally messed up. I even for a while got very, very serious about my religion, Catholicism. And for a period of about four months, I went to church like four times a week.

And I did all the indulgences. And you're still around 13. Yeah. And I thought that just didn't cut it for me. I even did read about existentialism. And that was really depressing. But, you know, thinking about what is the meaning of life and, you know, who am I? Where am I? Got me thinking, all right, where am I? Well, you know, thinking about what is the meaning of life and, you know, who am I, where am I, got me thinking, all right, where am I?

Well, you know, where is where? Beyond just being in the Bronx. Yeah, really. If you ask anyone, you're in the Bronx right now, ma'am. The ultimate existential question, is there anything outside the Bronx? So I started reading about the universe and about galaxies and stars and so on, and that's how I became interested in astronomy. That's the first that I've ever heard. But, you know, most males, I don't know if this worked for you,

most males seem to get interested in astronomy by doing things like grinding lenses and building telescopes. I was never a tinkerer. I was a seeker. That's how I described myself. I was a seeker. And I thought the answers to the question of the meaning of life, you know, lay in the universe. So if this were a few thousand years ago, you could have been a prophet. Think about it, because if you're young and you're having these kinds of questions, most adults don't even think that way. So you would have been labeled as someone with a search for wisdom, and then you'd acquire it and share it with others. And they probably would have, like, hung me for it.

No, it burns you. You're a girl. Oh, I'm a girl. They burn girls and they hang boys. They hang boys, they burn girls. This woman, her name was Carolyn Neatham, wrote, I thought, a very good article about me. It was the Scientist at Work series in the New York Times. And what year is this now? 1999.

Well, that's not that long ago. It's not like in the 80s or the 70s. No, it was done to be coincidental with Cassini's flyby of Earth, which happened in 1999. And then, you know, there was a lot of hoopla about whether or not the radioactive material on Cassini was going to destroy the Earth. So it flew by Earth to gain some extra orbital energy to get out to Saturn. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. Because you didn't have enough fuel to get it there on its own.

No. You had to, like like borrow orbital energy. Oh, we borrowed a lot. We're in debt. So what planets did you take orbital energy from? We took from Venus twice, would you believe? Twice? Oh, poor Venus. It's still there though. It's still there. All right. And one from Earth. And then we slipped closely by Jupiter. That really helped a lot. Yeah, of course. Yeah. All right. And that got you to Saturn. All right. But we digress. So August 1999, this article is being written, and the woman says truthful things, good things and bad things or whatever, and she submits it to her editors, and they come back and say, find out why Porco's not married. And I said to her, you see, I told you so.

I knew this kind of thing was going to happen because I knew they would be very sexist. Was not only not married, but never married. Never married. That's the real issue. There are plenty of not married people who have been. Yeah, how old was I then? I was 40-something.

In your 40s, okay. So I gave her two responses to use because I was kind of pissed. The first answer was something like, well, just tell them I have a different man every night and I like it that way. And then the other answer was, there are no high maintenance items in my house of any kind, pets, plants, or husbands. And Carolyn Neathammer, in her discretion, used that one. Used the second one rather than the first one.

And actually, I got a lot of fan mail from that. People writing me, oh, my 17-year-old daughter thought that was the greatest thing she ever heard. My advanced age, there are still no high-maintenance items in my house of any kind, pets, plants, or husbands. What's this about you trying to get everybody to smile? What's that about? That was probably the greatest thing I've ever done. We'll be the judge of that. Well, let me back up. There have been other pale blue dot pictures taken by other missions,

right? Mars missions probably took many pictures of the Earth from Mars orbit. Yeah, because Earth shows up in the Martian sky. Yeah. And people, of course, they got moved by the first pale blue dot. They wanted to do it over again, too. So I'm thinking not only would ours be even more gorgeous because we're going to see Saturn in the field with Earth. Saturn is unimpeachably beautiful in any shot. Right. But I thought, wouldn't it be fabulous if, well, let me back up. In all those previous But this is the second time you've backed us up. I don't know where I am now. In all those previous pale blue dot images, the picture was taken,

and then afterwards people were told, look, here was the Earth taken three weeks ago. And I'm thinking, well, why don't we tell people in advance, your picture is going to be taken from the outer solar system from a billion miles away. And I wanted to use this as an opportunity for people having a communal feeling with the universe. Is the spiritual side of you showing up? It is. I'm sorry. You're going up. And I thought it would be just fantastic.

People could feel a sense of unity with the cosmos. They could feel a sense of unity with their fellow human. And they could also appreciate, at that moment, their pictures being taken from a billion miles away. How better to let them know how far humans have come in the exploration of the solar system. It becomes something personal to them. So you're telling me you actually got people to go outside and look up at Saturn in the sky and smile at it. Well, no, no, here, even the people on the other side of the planet smiled. Because the idea was to smile in celebration,

to get this communal feeling out of people, this kind of cosmic love. I was after cosmic love. Where were you in the 60s? We needed you there. What do you mean? I was about 16 years old smoking dope. What were you doing?

I can say that now because it's legal in my state. I don't know. Colorado, yeah. You're from Colorado. So anyway, I was after cosmic love. And it worked state. I don't know. Colorado, yeah, you're from Colorado. So anyway, I was after Cosmic Love and it worked and I was so proud. There was quite the social media attention given to it in blogs and in the Twitter streams.

It ended up not being announced as early as I would have liked. We should have done it a year ahead for various reasons I won't go into. It didn't get announced until a month ahead. So there wasn't really as big a campaign and as big an announcement as I would have liked. But nonetheless, we got comments from people that were just beautiful. People saying, my God, I've never felt a feeling like this. You know, for once

I felt so united with everybody around the globe. And one person wrote, you know, darn it, we may be floating around on a dust moat. We may be transient. But for 15 minutes, we were there, we were aware, and we smiled. And that's exactly the kind of feeling I wanted people to have. That's beautiful. Oh, thank you. And I have to say this. For me, it was the same thing. I mean, I'm the one who started this whole thing. But the 15 minutes that it was happening, and I'm looking where Saturn is, and I'm thinking, wow, there's a camera there taking our picture. And knowing that people all over the world were doing the same thing, it was fabulous. It was so fabulous. So I'm pretty pleased with the way it turned out. By the way, I called the whole event the day the Earth smiled,

because that's what it was. And that photo made page one of the New York Times. Oh, man, was that cool. Back on November 13th, 2013. November 13th? 13, 11, 13. That was the very day that I got the phone call from NASA headquarters that I was made the imaging team leader. Is that cosmic or what? The day of the year. I mean, in what year?

1990. 1990. Okay. So there is cosmic alignment. Cosmic love and alignment, Neil. Right here on your show. We're wrapping up our season five time capsule show with Adam Savage and Jamie Heinemann, stars of the hit TV show Mythbusters.

Actually, we were hired talent at the beginning. We had nothing to do with the pitch for Mythbusters. I won't say that we had nothing to do with the creation. So you were pretty faces is is what you're saying? Well, it was just a job. You know, we gotta pay the rent. Somebody contacted Jamie, said, do you want to do this show called

Mythbusters? And I'm like, that's never gonna happen. But just as a matter of principle, I went ahead and tried it, because you gotta try things. Try it means screen test, or you tried it? Well, actually, yeah, so he called me up and said, listen, I got this call from Discovery about this thing. I don't think I could do it on my own, but you're a ham,

so you want to shoot a demo reel together? I had to think of who's a ham that I know, but also somebody that's good at doing what we do because it wasn't just about talking. It was about replicating urban legends and the fact that we were guys that build things was part of this premise that we would actually replicate these things so you become a participant in the test not just an

observer of something exactly and in terms of you know being freelancers where we're always trying to look at what the next avenue is i had actually just bought a laptop the first power book that you could edit digital video on and it was teaching myself myself. Way back in the day. Way back, the Pismo, and I was teaching myself digital video editing. And so when Jamie called, I had all the equipment necessary, and we shot what ended up being a 14-minute demo reel, and they ended up kind of building the backbone of the show off of that demo reel. So you got to shape the profile of the show based on how you expressed your talents. No one told us that we had done that for several years.

Yeah, and you also have to understand a little bit of background. Adam and I, we're not exactly friends, but in fact, we don't get along very well at all. In 21 years, we've never had dinner alone together. Yeah, but we have common interests, and I would call Adam up and come down and check this out. I'm tinkering in the shop on the weekend. We're professionally interested in what each other was doing. Yeah. I'm tinkering in the shop on the weekend. We were professionally interested in what each other was doing. Yeah.

The third time we revisited the rocket car. It's an original Darwin Award myth where a guy strapped a military jettisoned takeoff rocket to his Impala and supposedly flew a mile through the air, embedded into a mountain, and they pulled his teeth out of the wreckage to identify him. That was actually our very first episode. So you wanted to redo that. Well, we did it first 10 years ago. Yeah, that's something I want to do. Then we did it a second time where we got these really powerful rockets that blew up on the stand. So we spent 20 grand on these rockets. Everything we did worked perfectly. The rockets blew up. It took us another five years to convince

Discovery to fork over enough dough to do it for real. And this time we did two launches last summer in the Mojave desert, one with a car hitting a bump in the road and the other with a real straight up ramp. But why is that interesting? Sure, I put rockets on my car, I fly. Well, there's two things to this. The first... Is the car's version of a jetpack? Essentially, except that rockets aren't shaped like cars for a very good reason. And so the first time we did it, we put the normal J-dough amount of power on the car,

and it only accelerated the car to 150 miles an hour. And traditionally on Mythbusters, when we get to a place like that, we want to find out what would it take to replicate the behavior that is stated in the myth to get the car to accelerate to 350 miles an hour and fly perhaps roughly a mile through the air. At 350 miles an hour, you go backwards in time. The red shifting. Marty! So then we... Get the flux capacitor! The math said to get the car up to that speed, and we attempted to balance

correctly using, you know, model rocketry formulas to get the rockets in the right place. The question is, if you have the car balanced and the rockets in the right place, and they have enough power, will they actually make the car fly straight and true? And that was the

answer we hadn't fully come to as the second part of the story. That was half of the design concern in the Apollo era. If you have a straight rocket, how do you point it? How do you aim it? Well, we, of course, could have gone to a place where we start to add fins and do other things to this car. We get people that say, why don't you just put fins on the thing or anything? And we say, that's a car-shaped rocket. We want a rocket car. Gotcha. For us, there's an ethical difference. Your formula said that you'd be able to fly

at 350 miles an hour. Yes. According to the amount of rocket power we had. So did it? It never really got the chance to get... They were so unstable that they tended to... So the answer is no. The answer is no. Let me hear you say it. The answer is no. Did it work? No.

The scientist, I mean, wants to say, I guess on an infinitely straight track, maybe, but with us going off a bump in the road, it's too unstable and they bounced after about They did what I was talking about, which is they interact with the ground rather quickly. Interact. You guys have a whole euphemistic vocabulary. The other favorite term is catastrophic failure. That is my favorite engineering term. Yeah, we use that all the time on this show.

Or in rocket propulsion lore, there are rocket launchers that succeed and others that are rich in learning opportunities. What is the weirdest urban legend that turned out to be true? Elephants Afraid of Mike. No, don't say that. We were in South Africa filming with sharks and bad weather kept us off the water. Wait, because everyone for Discovery Channel has to

do sharks at some point. Yeah, we've done Shark Week twice. Three times. This is Rites of Passage. Oh, yeah. But bad weather kept us off the water which was a disaster from a production standpoint. So we went in inland and thought, well, let's just produce five minutes of filler. Let's do Elephants Are Afraid of mice. So we found someone with some mice. We found a nature

preserve with some sad elephants and we set up a procedure. We got a big ball of dung. Elephant turds are like basketballs. And we hollowed out a space in the bottom of the turd. Big enough for a very unhappy mouse. Yeah, one very unhappy mouse in there. Tied monofilament onto it and went and hid behind a bush. And the people at the game reserve opened the fence. They knew that the elephants... The elephants walk on paths that are predictable. Yeah, and we thought this was a fluff piece. The elephant's not going to be able to see what the little mouse or...

We thought our biggest problem was going to be, what do we do when the elephant steps on the mouse? Do we film it? Yeah. Show it? Generally, yeah. Bam, he meets Godzilla. Yeah, so the elephant comes out on cue,

and darned if it didn't come screeching to a stop once the mouse came out. Yeah, and it very carefully almost tiptoed around. No! Totally, totally, totally. No! Like Disney-style tiptoeing around a mouse. So then we're thinking, well, maybe the elephant's never seen its own dung roll by its own accord. Maybe it's afraid of its dung. So we removed the mouse.

We had another elephant come through. We moved the dung. Elephant didn't do a darn thing. Yeah, and then we repeated the— This is the control that you're trying to put into the thing. We posited that that must be a control. Then we added another mouse and did it with a different elephant. And the same thing happened.

Got the same result. So it wasn't just a neurotic— No, not a neurotic elephant. We did have—and this is another thing that I love, we were doing an appearance at a college a few years ago and this eight-year-old girl raised her hand. She was like, I wanted to know why you used a white mouse

in the experiment. Elephants are afraid of mice because they're not very natural. Why didn't you use a more natural colored mouse? And I said, you're absolutely right. It's because we weren't thinking far enough ahead. We thought we were doing a fluff piece and we just wanted something that was bright on camera. She was all over that story.

She was totally all over it. More power to her. A future scientist. We failed. You've been listening to StarTalk Radio. I'm Neil deGrasse Tyson. And as always, I bid you to keep looking up.