Quotes from Neil deGrasse Tyson

But we take better care of our cats and dogs than we do of homeless humans in the street. If we serve as pets to aliens, might they take better care of us than we ever will of ourselves?

Although they could have also used the occasion as a teaching moment—a mind-blowing lesson on comparative risk. But that works only if people are open to learning. In modern times, many of us don't satisfy that criterion, perhaps because, according to the nineteenth-century British essayist Walter Bagehot,18

Twinkling happens when the light from a distant point travels through that atmosphere; its light beam dances ever so slightly in random directions many times—sometimes thousands of times—each second.

By 2017, Star Wars had barely made it past the concept stage.

Every time you turn a bigger telescope to the night sky, we end up smaller than we had previously imagined…It is an ego-dismantling device

It's not always the smartest person who makes a good astronaut. It's personality. You need to be able to live with someone for a long time—be unflappable and easy to get along with because you're confined in a small space for years.

Neil: Were you strapped to a Saturn V rocket, with nine million pounds of thrust, and sent a quarter-million miles away into deep space to witness Earthrise from lunar orbit on Christmas Eve? Madalyn: No. Neil: Then shut the fuck up. In

Neil: Were you strapped to a Saturn V rocket, with nine million pounds of thrust, and sent a quarter-million miles away into deep space to witness Earthrise from lunar orbit on Christmas Eve? Madalyn: No. Neil: Then shut the fuck up.

The largest black hole that could have evaporated since the big bang would have to have been smaller than an atomic nucleus.

la materia le dice al espacio cómo curvarse, y el espacio le dice a la materia cómo moverse.

JWST will be sensitive to both optical and infrared light. Its adaptive optics will be able to pick out infant galaxies as well as planets orbiting distant stars.

you take a swig of water…It contains water molecules that have passed through the kidneys of Abraham Lincoln, of Genghis Khan, of Jesus…

Astronomers think much of Earth's oceans could have been formed by comets striking our planet and depositing their water on Earth's surface.

The Olympics owes its existence to the search for people who perform faster, higher, and stronger among us. Standardized exams, game shows, beauty contests, talent auditions, and the Forbes 400 all pit humans against humans, in rank order. Society offers hundreds, if not thousands of ways to show you're better than others.

Half of the stars you see aren't solo stars at all. They're double, multiple, triple, quadruple star systems. Even, for example, the nearest star to the sun, Alpha Centauri, that's a multiple star system.

Each of us, for all practical purposes, is unique in the universe—now and forever. Being alive is the time to celebrate being alive—every waking moment. Along the way, why not strive to make the world a better place today than yesterday, simply for the privilege of having lived in it.

In life, lots of things occupy two or more classifications

Parts of Mars' surface is very close to the triple point of water, when it can be solid, liquid, and steam at the same time.

We explore the solar system and the rest of the cosmos with our robots, which are basically our eyes and our ears. So it's great: I get to go explore the cosmos from the comfort of my couch, which I love. I can still eat doughnuts…It's a much better life." —DR. AMY MAINZER, ASTROPHYSICIST

Frozen water is less dense than liquid water…and ice floats. In the winter, the top surface [of a lake] gets cold. The top water will freeze, and not drop, thereby insulating the liquid water below, protecting the fishes through the winter months. It's a remarkable feature of water.

consider a spherical cow.

While there, I came to resent labels of all kinds. What are they, if not intellectually lazy ways of asserting you know everything about a person you've never met?

Had Herschel succeeded, the planet list would read: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and George.

Are Robots "Them" or "Us"?