Neil deGrasse Tyson (Caught on Camera): The Universe is Trying to Kill You | Big Think

Neil deGrasse Tyson (Caught on Camera): The Universe is Trying to Kill You
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Are UFOs actually alien spacecraft visiting Earth? They might be, says Neil deGrasse Tyson, but if you want to make that claim you better bring the evidence to support it.Eyewitness testimony is the lowest form of evidence. To measure what is true or not true in the world, we require data -- and when it comes to alien appearances, it's as astronomer Carl Sagan said: "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."So what can you do to prove your alien abduction story? Take selfies, live-stream video to the internet, and if you happen to find yourself in a spacecraft getting your "gonads poked", then grab an item from the alien lab as evidence before they release you back on Earth. Neil deGrasse Tyson wants to believe, but not until he sees the data.
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NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON:

Neil deGrasse Tyson was born and raised in New York City where he was educated in the public schools clear through his graduation from the Bronx High School of Science. Tyson went on to earn his BA in Physics from Harvard and his PhD in Astrophysics from Columbia. He is the first occupant of the Frederick P. Rose Directorship of the Hayden Planetarium. His professional research interests are broad, but include star formation, exploding stars, dwarf galaxies, and the structure of our Milky Way. Tyson obtains his data from the Hubble Space Telescope, as well as from telescopes in California, New Mexico, Arizona, and in the Andes Mountains of Chile.Tyson is the recipient of nine honorary doctorates and the NASA Distinguished Public Service Medal. His contributions to the public appreciation of the cosmos have been recognized by the International Astronomical Union in their official naming of asteroid "13123 Tyson".

Tyson's new book is Letters From an Astrophysicist (2019).
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TRANSCRIPT:

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: There are many people who see things in the sky and are sure – they can't explain it, so they're sure it's aliens visiting. Well, if you were really, really sure of that, you are not likely to write me a letter. Unless you're writing me a letter to convince me of your point of view. But that doesn't make for a fertile exchange. If you see lights in the sky and you don't know what they are and you want further insight on what they could be and write me a letter, that's a meaningful exchange.

If you can't explain what it is and it's flying and it's an object, it's an unidentified flying object, period. You just said you don't know what it is so that sentence should not continue beyond that phrase. You can't say I don't know what it is, therefore, it must be aliens visiting from another planet. If you don't know what it is it therefore must not be anything.

Okay, so maybe we are getting visited by aliens daily. In all of these sightings, it's aliens. I don't have a problem with that. My issue is what you are presenting as evidence in support of that claim. If it's entirely grounded in your eyewitness testimony you need to know that eyewitness testimony on the totem of weight of evidence it is at the bottom. A little scary because in the court of law it's considered pretty high evidence. People say, "I need a witness!" No, you want data. That's what you really want. You want information that didn't have to pass through someone's sensory system so that you can minimize bias, delusion, the filtering that we always do as the world outside of us comes through our senses for us to then decide what is and what is not going on around us. It's why we invented science. So that we wouldn't have to depend on our senses as the ultimate measure of what is or is not true in the world.

Science and its methods and tools. The telescope, the microscope, the recorders, chart recorders, all of this. So, the best thing is—and by the way, I don't care what your pedigree is. I don't care if you're a military colonel, pilot, Air Force. Are you human? That's all that matters. After that give me better evidence. And yes, Carl Sagan's famous dictum, "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." So the best thing is to drag the alien into town square and you'll be rich and famous overnight. You don't have to argue with me. I'm not stopping you. Go ahead. But do you know what's more significant than that fact is that today, worldwide, we are uploading to the internet a billion photographs a day. Everyone has a camera and a video camera. Remember all those reports of pe...

[johnbright]

Jeez, he didn't mean it like that. It should be our call to action to subdue nature and make our lives easier by figuring out the workings of the universe.

With that said, I'd rather live knowing as much as I could than not caring or exploring what is out there even if I never find the ultimate end/answer to existence, knowledge, science, reason, etc.

"Ignorance is bliss" is such an obsolete phrase. I'd change it to "Ignorance is bliss, but not the most possible bliss you may ever receive."

[EDarien]

Also, while we're on the subject of medical knowledge, Dr. Warburg did win the Nobel prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1931 for discovering the respiratory process of cancer cells, not for curing it.

[dougrattmann]

"That we live in a universe which permits life is remarkable. That we live in one which destroys galaxies and stars and worlds is also remarkable. The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent to the concerns of such puny creatures as we."

Dr. Carl Sagan

[ETBX]

When I first heard this quote somewhere, it struck a chord, looking at how hard "survival" can be, to the point it does seem calculated against us.
I realized that it can all be summed up in what makes the universe what we call “violent” (and life “difficult”) is that:
•The energy of the universe pushes matter to be constantly changing.
•Living beings need the matter they depend on (bodies, shelter, etc.), to stay in their current form, to sustain the living state (i.e. “survival”)
•We are essentially going against nature in trying to maintain these temporary particular, specific forms as they are tugged on by forces such as gravity and oxidation (the latter, covering air, water and fire damage alike), in addition to other creatures also needing to survive, and thus competing with, defending against or even preying on each other.

I'm sure this was what Tyson was saying, in his wry way.

[allenjunge]

But for those variations to happen, they must change over time. If one were to take a look at the Gilapagos island birds, one would see the difference in beaks. This is because a beginning, small mutation allowed the birds to eat a certain food. As these birds reproduced, they needed to spread out or risk hitting the carrying capacity of the island. When they did, a series of small physical changes, or mutations, allowed each new species to survive on their island(s).

[JungleJargon]

"Man in his pomp, yet without understanding, Is like the beasts that perish."
"But these, like unreasoning animals, born as creatures of instinct to be captured and killed, reviling where they have no knowledge, will in the destruction of those creatures also be destroyed, suffering wrong as the wages of doing wrong."

[guspolly]

What is the name of this stock music? I've heard it on too many radio commercials to count!

[keniangervo]

I agree with Mr. Tyson 100%. This Universe is definitely not designed for "optimal living". It all of course depends how one defines what optimal living is - and what an optimal Universe would be. If multiverse exists there could be Universes with new forces. Maybe a universe with a different kind of set of rules, the beings there could be eternal, consisting of maybe energy or something else. It's all about how far you're willing to stretch your imagination :) I hope there exists such Universes

[permakilt]

To be honest, I'm not that opposed to it. I assume BigThink mentor is going to be pulling in some big names and they're going to expect some type of compensation for their time, likely more than the amount of views from adsense would support. They're offering an optional service and they can charge if they want, you don't have to buy in. Just be glad the main Big Thinks channel is still free. Its quite nice of them to entertain us intelligently for free (well at no cost to us).

[Zagexi]

If we can't evolve big enough to stop tornadoes, we can at least be smart enough to avoid them.

[zhoohz]

The universe just give a shit about what we consider happiness. Indifferent as fuck.

[JungleJargon]

Knowing did not begin with the Greeks, it began with Adam and Eve.
The only problem there was that they learned (the hard way) what bad information would do.

[aeon]

Mutations *do* program for change. The four nucleotides that comprise DNA—abbreviated by the letters A, T, G, and C—are analogous to Machine Code, i.e. Binary Code—0s and 1s. Mutations result from damage/error in transcribing the ATGCs, and thus mutations change the programming.

In short—mutations program for change.

Mutations are the source of genetic variation. Every organism is a product of mutations accepted or rejected by the evolutionary pressures of their environment.

[JungleJargon]

Variations are by design for the sake of adaptability.
It is not errors that make adaptations possible.
It is a part of the design.

[ejjz]

It's really fun to watch an ad for a channel (Mentor) that not only charges you money if you want to learn, but also is not available in Sweden. If you we're "big thinkers" you wouldn't roll out new unique content on an untested platform. It's a shame that everything except 30 sec clips gets put behind a paywall now. And as soon as you comment with a good argument on their discussion board, your comment gets deleted, leaving only the weak arguments for people to see and disagree with.

[dtbofficial]

You can try to outsmart the universe all you want, but it always wins in the end. Nobody gets out alive.

[JunohProductions]

I hate Youtube's Subscription feature. I like Big Think but I'm not going to pay 20 dollars a year to see a few small clips.

[KingTaltia]

The Big Think usually makes me think. But Neil deGrasse Tyson you have, for the first time on this channel, made me laugh. Bravo for proving that Big Think is smart, and funny.

[learneroftruth]

It's not "trying" to kill anyone, the universe doesn't have a purpose, its random chaos. If the universe killed earth it would be purely random, just as a tornado or a hurricane is.

[allenjunge]

But your missing my point. Every change that leads to a new species undergoes some form of mutation. In the case of the birds, that mutation was the beak size, hardness, and strenth. Due to the small changes that occurred, they got farther and farther away from the common ancestor, until they fragmented into a completely new species, so yes, mutations do drive new directives.