Cosmic Queries – Life on Other Planets with Aomawa Shields

21:52so

21:52Neil deGrasse Tyson:tell me what how does all this fold into this this book that you just wrote i'm so excited for this book this has been a dream of mine for a long time and as you know i have i was an astronomer then i trained i changed and studied acting and then i came back and finished my phd and became a professional astronomer and a professor and for the longest time i was trying to reconcile these two things that I loved, acting and astronomy. And I thought that they couldn't coexist. I thought I had to choose. And when I would share with people those two loves, I got a lot of like, what? This is so strange.

22:31Why? How? And I think I internalized that and tried to figure it out. And it was funny because when I stopped figuring it out, these incredible miracles got to happen where I saw how they can really coexist, like hosting a science TV show, which I could never have planned on my own. Eventually going back to grad school in part because of your suggestion and being put in touch with you and your mentorship. And also I had applied to the astronaut candidate program and had not reached the next level. It was like everything was saying, go back, get your PhD. And I finally became willing to listen.

23:10And so the book really is about that whole journey. It's about why I fell in love with the stars and the night sky and why I fell in love with acting and this whole edge that I carried for a long time of like feeling like I was an astronomer or a scientist around actors, feeling like I was an actor around scientists. and eventually coming into full acceptance of this non-traditional background that I had and how it could really make me a better scientist and a better communicator because of it. It's about the whole journey. First of all, that's beautiful what you just said because it's a reconciliation of self, which I think is always a wonderful, wonderful thing that anyone has ever...

24:00Neil deGrasse Tyson:You could be a counselor. You could be like a therapist. Yeah, if you want to mess up your life.

24:11Neil deGrasse Tyson:No, I think if you have these loves, you know, I too had sort of secondary pathways, but none as significant in my life as your acting was. But I just did little things. I doodled and I liked calligraphy when I should have been doing other things. But now when I sign my books, I use a calligraphic pen. and the people who received the book, they appreciated that much. It was little things like that. You find a way to fold it in, your life and the lives of others are much more enriched. So I'm so glad that you pursued what you love rather than what people thought you should be doing. Thank you. I have to say, I still remember, and you're going to find out.

24:48You probably read parts of it already, but if not, you'll see later. You're in the book. I'm in the book, okay. Wait a minute, wait a minute. Am I in the book? you're going to have to read it to find out.

25:04Neil deGrasse Tyson:And you're in the book. And you're in the book. Who isn't in the book? There are a lot of people who are in the book. But like I write about that moment when, you know, I first met you in person at the AAS, the American Astronomical Society. That's our professional conference for those who don't know what AAS means. And we sat, you know, on some umbrella chairs or whatever, and people were walking by like, is that... Is that who we think it is? Is that Neil deGrasse Tyson? And, you know, and you were just there. And I think I, like, started to cry at one point because I, you know, we've been talking about my background and how I had, you know, there were ups and downs.

25:42I had struggled academically because my head was not in the place, like, my heart and my head were not in the same place. You know? You know, it's funny because I cried when I met Neil, too. Stop. But that's because he was standing on my foot the whole time he was talking to me. And he's a big guy. I'm telling you, he's a large man. It was not pleasant.

26:07Neil deGrasse Tyson:Wait, Omar, plus it didn't help matters that you also married an actor. Isn't that right if I remember correctly? Is that correct? I did, yes. And he is 100 % actor. He doesn't have the, like, actor, scientist, engineer, architect. Distractions, distractions. action. He's a 100 % actor, although he does enjoy those doomsday Nat Geo shows or Super Volcano. Okay, yeah. That's in us. He's a lot. But what I'm saying is that that would have been a force that would have been supportive of your acting, correct? I presume. We met in acting grad school. He was my classmate. Oh, God. You were becoming a real actor.

26:46She said acting grad school. Grad school. Yes. Okay. Listen. Listen, that's the real stuff. That's when you're just like, you know how people say, well, I'm going to be an actor. And they're like, well, you're never going to get a job. When you say, I'm going to acting grad school, they'll be like, oh, you're getting a job.

27:07That's what we hoped and expected. That wasn't always the case. But yes, I wanted to study it in the same way that I studied astronomy. And that was so much fun. So I had left the PhD program that I was struggling academically in, and I had an old white male professor tell me to consider other career options. And I internalized that and left. And when I got to acting grad school, it was like I was free. I felt so light. But it wasn't like it was easier compared to astronomy grad school. it was harder in a different way. And I write about this. It was like, it didn't, it wasn't necessarily about the brain cells working overtime.

27:56It was about dredging up my emotions and feelings and childhood experiences and like bringing it all up, you know, that I needed to use it to embody these different characters.

28:05Neil deGrasse Tyson:Summoning it on command. Yeah. Summoning it on command, yeah. It's gotta be real. It's gotta be real. Yeah. Wow. So you stitched this, you made a tapestry of your life with your professional ambitions in this book. So it's part memoir, part advice column? Is that fair? Yeah, there's a little bit of, there's certainly, it's all spoken, for the most part, in the first person. Like, this is what I did. This is what helped me make my life better and reconcile these different parts of myself. And I hope that I'm writing it for the people that have that question of like, is it too late? There's that part of me that I never could bring up into my life.

28:47But it's always been there. Like I say in the book, when you leave a dream behind, it never dies. It's like sitting on the side of the road and eventually it'll catch up. And that's what happened for me. And the whole message of the book is that it's not too late and that if there's no role model that's doing what you want to do, you can be your own role model.

29:10Neil deGrasse Tyson:Yeah, that's right. And in fact, if you always needed a role model, you would only ever do things that other people did before you. But sometimes you have to trailblaze. And like you just said, if you become your own role model, that's harder, of course. And you've got to figure things out on the fly. But if and when you succeed, then people say, of course, that's what I always wanted to do. Those who come behind you. So just congratulations on that. Yeah, thank you. It's fantastic. Well, Chuck, let's get to some queries. All right, why not? Especially tuned for this visit. Absolutely. These are questions from our Patreon members?

29:46Patreon patrons who just for a haltery, almost insignificant,$5 a month. All right. This is Mike Parker. And Mike Parker says, hello, Dr. Shields. Mike Parker here from Richmond, Virginia. If life does exist in our solar system, which planet or moon do you think offers the most promising location? I love it. In fact, give me the top three cases in order. Oh, my gosh. Not just one. Okay. This is a fantastic question. Thank you for asking it. Europa, which is Jupiter, a moon of Jupiter, would be my top. even though there's a lot of buzz right now around Saturn's moon Enceladus, which would be my number two, the next one.

30:36Saturn's moon Enceladus has geysers, geysers of liquid water that are shooting out from its South Pole. And there was a recent -

30:44Neil deGrasse Tyson:Can't argue with geysers. And apparently all of the basic elements of life are there. There you go. Geysers lead to geysers. Geysers lead to geysers. I don't think that's how language works okay and then gosh number three give me a third one I'm thinking I mean I I'm skeptical about Mars Mars under surface Mars where you know there might be some liquid water in aquifers I'll be your third option I was about to say that but I'm skeptical But yes. Or it could be Mars might have fossilized life. Okay. So the life was there. It's no longer there. But that still counts. Because it ain't here. It ain't here.

31:35If we can prove that it was there, it still counts as life because it was there. True. And we have so much. I'll give you that. And there's so much evidence of liquid water on the surface at some point.

31:46Neil deGrasse Tyson:At one point. Yeah. All right. Right. Excellent. Excellent question there. Yes. Nice question. Keep it going, Chuck. Mike Parker, way to go. All right. Here we go. This is Sherry Cariso. And Sherry Cariso says, Hello, Dr. Shields. Do the ideal conditions for life on extrasolar planets depend on the star itself? Or are the requirements the same no matter what? Also, thank you. Thank you for Rising Star Girls. I am registering my niece. You are an inspiration. Sherry from San Diego. Thank you so much, Sherry, for asking that question. And can't wait to see your niece in Rising Star Girls workshops.

32:32Rising Star Girls hosts summer. We host annual virtual workshops during the summer for middle school girls of color. And that means ages 10 to 14 or 15, roughly. Oh, wow. No one is turned away. And it's virtual? And they're virtual. So we have girls that participate from all over the country. and we even have girls participate from other countries too. And we're ramping up to do even more. We also host educator webinars where we show educators how to use the activities in our handbook with girls in their own communities all over the world. So, and back to your question, the ingredient, the primary ingredients for life are liquid water or a liquid, which on our planet is water.

33:23And as we know, we can't just look for water, but that's our first order thing. We're looking for some liquid that life can use to make the stuff it needs to carry out its chemical processes and reactions. Some kind of energy source, whether it's the sun, the star, or chemical energy, like life that lives in the deep ocean around these hydrothermal vents, has no access to sunlight, and yet there's life there. So it's using the chemistry of rocks and heat from the core of the earth. Can I add there that when I was taught biology, it was only assumed that life could thrive. It was assumed that life could only use sunlight because we hadn't discovered the life at the bottom of the ocean yet.

34:10Neil deGrasse Tyson:So they had to broaden the definition. Not that life depends on the sun, but life depends on an energy source. So I like this, that that's now folded into that definition. Okay, so keep going. And then the last one is the basic building blocks of life, like some kind of environment for life to make its, you know, to carry out its metabolic processes and to use. So we think of this like it needs sulfur or phosphorus or oxygen or nitrogen or carbon. These are like the basic elements of life. So. The organic chemistry. Yeah. The organics. Organics. Okay. energy source, and liquid. So all of those things are what we look for when we're looking for a planet that could be habitable.

34:56And for the part that I am really focused on is where could the climate be suitable for water to not freeze, not evaporate away, but to stay in liquid form somewhere on that surface. And so this can be affected by the type of star, as you bring up in your question. Because this starlight can be different depending on the temperature of the star, how that starlight interacts with the surface of the planet, the various atmospheric molecules on that planet, that can influence the planet's climate. So it does depend on the star. But those three ingredients are the main ingredients that we think any kind of planet would need to host life, to keep life going for a long time.

35:48Now you just made me think of a question that I've, if it's a dumb question, just let me know. There are no dumb questions. That is not true. You have not heard me ask questions. When people say there's no dumb questions, I'm like, just wait. No, but so are there different stars that give off different colors and can look like our star is white? Are there different stars that give off different colors and can those different colors actually affect the development of light? I mean, of life. That is the complete opposite of a dumb question. That is a fantastic question. So, yeah, I'm not going to believe anything you say now.

36:25Okay. It's not a dumb question. It just popped in my head. So when it just pops in my head, I'm like, maybe that's a dumbass question. Never, never. So, yes, different stars have different colors. And if you are fortunate enough to live someplace where you don't have a lot of light pollution, if you go out on your porch or your stoop and look up, you'll see this. You'll see this in action that all of the stars don't all look the same. Some of them look white. Some of them look yellow. Some look a little orange or a little red. And if they're twinkling, that's a pretty good bet that that's a star.

37:02If it's not twinkling, then you can be more convinced that it's a planet. There's a lot more stuff between us and a star than there is between us and a planet in our own solar system. And so there's a lot more atmospheric distortion and turbulence, and that's what we see as twinkling. But anyway, yes, the colors are real, and that has to do with the temperature of the star and how much light it's emitting. And that light, again, that's going to, if there's a planet around that star and just about every star in our galaxy has a planet around it, may not be in the habitable zone, but just about every star has a planet, then that planet, if it's got an atmosphere, if it's got a surface, that light is going to be shining down on that planet.

37:53And how much light is in what region of the spectrum the color of that light is definitely going to influence how it interacts with what's on that planet and the weather, the temperature, the climate of that planet.

38:07Neil deGrasse Tyson:So you have one of the most complicated problems to solve out there, it seems to me, because it's not just light shining on the planet. It's like, how does the chemistry of the atmosphere interact with the light that's shining down on the planet? Does it get absorbed? Does it get re-emitted? Is it reflected? And then Somewhere in there, maybe there's life. It's so true. This sounds like a really hard problem. It is a really hard problem. Because those same cool stars that comprise 70 % of all stars in the galaxy, those M stars, they're really awesome because they're so numerous. And there's a lot of advantages to looking for life around those stars.

38:46But there's some disadvantages, too. They have really long phases where they send out a lot of X-ray and UV radiation shooting shooting towards the surface. And we know the reason why we wear sunscreen is that UV radiation is not good for biology. And so it could be that, you know, life could only exist at the bottom of the ocean on those planets. It really -

39:10Neil deGrasse Tyson:Where you're protected from the UV. Where you're protected. Water is a good UV absorber. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Okay, cool. Super cool.

39:22our listeners love puzzles paradoxes and hidden patterns almost as much as we do on tiktok those fascinations come to life people are breaking down physics exploring geology and explaining why the world works the way it does you'll see impressive experiments explanations that finally make sense and connections you didn't expect. It's like having a lab, a lecture hall and science museum in your pocket. TikTok is where wonder is shared, where curiosity turns into discovery and where millions learn something new every day. Every discovery starts with a question. What if? Why? How? When it comes to education, Southern New Hampshire University has answers.

40:08Whether you want to build new skills or pursue a lifelong passion, SNHU has over 200 online programs to expand your horizons. And the flexible format lets you learn on your schedule without putting life on hold. So if you're asking, what's next for me? It's time to find out. Explore what's possible at snhu.edu. That's snhu.edu. From the world and creators of The Big Bang Theory comes a new Max original comedy series, Stuart, Fails to Save the Universe. After accidentally creating a new multiverse, comic store owner Stuart Bloom must locate a quantum interference device to restore reality. Executive producers Chuck Lorre, Zach Penn and Bill Prady deliver the adventure of a lifetime.

40:59Catch the new Max original comedy series streaming Thursdays at 9pm exclusively on HBO Max. Subscription required.

41:29neat journey through the cosmos of astronomy and theater, two fields that are often mentioned never in the same sentence, let alone in the same career. You have boldly gone where few have gone before and leading the way and ensuring others from diverse backgrounds can do the same through your work with your rising star girls. In your perspective, how could this universe of diverse talent and experiences propel us further into the final frontier? How do you think incorporating a spectrum of perspectives in astronomy could accelerate our interstellar mission to understand and reach other worlds.

42:07Whoa. Now, wait a minute. Is your husband named Omar?

42:15Is it about to be? No, I'm kidding. That was an excellently written question and recited. So, yeah, I'm going to say, Omar, you want to read this book. Oh, look at that. This has got the whole journey in there, pretty much everything.

42:33Neil deGrasse Tyson:I see what you did there. And go to risingstargirls.org because you'll see we're not just teaching these girls astronomy and astrobiology. We're not just saying, hey, there's stars out there, there's galaxies, these are the names. They get to write a poem about what they're learning. They get to design their own exoplanet and make choices about how many stars it orbits. And if there's life there, and if there's not, why not? They get to write their own constellation myths. They get to calculate the distance from the Earth to different solar system bodies and units of themselves. So we're doing this all to develop a personal connection between these girls and the universe, of which they're an integral part.

43:19So we're processing what they learn through a creative arts-based lens. And I wanted to bring it back to Rising Stargirls because that's really, my journey has been epitomized by this program. The arts and the sciences are not as disparate as many people might think. In both cases, it's about the story. Everything has a story. planets, stars, they all live, right? And they die. And there's a story of their becoming and there's a story of their evolution and there's a story of their deaths, right?

44:00Neil deGrasse Tyson:Except planets don't have mother issues. Right. Later in life. That's right. There's certain stories they're not going to tell. I'm pretty sure. Yeah, the stories are different, but there's a journey. There are stories nonetheless. There are stories nonetheless. Or the stories of humans on the stage or on the screen, right? Looking to live as one of my method acting teachers used to say, right? Trying to find happiness and fulfillment. So there's that whole like science and the arts. And in fact, not only are they not as disparate as we might think, but they actually interweaving them is the key in my mind to answering your question is to creating imaginative thinkers and enlightened scientists and enlightened artists, for that matter, realizing that these disciplines can fuel each other, can be used to elevate our core understanding of the human experience and the universal experience.

45:00So that would be my best way to answer that really exciting question.

45:07Neil deGrasse Tyson:Can I add to that as a minimum? in a day when only men did science, it means half the population of the world, half the intellectual capital of our species was not at the table. That's right. At the time, anyone is thinking about how the universe works. So the extent to which you can extend that to have 100 % of our species have access to, whether they choose it, that's another question. Right. But if they don't access to it, then you can ensure that we're getting the best minds who want to actually think about our past, present, and future in the universe. And right now, that is not the case.

45:43That is absolutely not the case. Well, physically, it was half. Percentage-wise, it was way more than half. What?

45:53Okay,

45:57Neil deGrasse Tyson:it was half of the mass, and less than half the actual brain power in the universe. I get it. Yeah, and we want these girls to claim ownership of what they're learning, to know that they matter, that they're an integral part of this universe, that just in the same way that if we were to look at the Milky Way galaxy through one type of light, just visible light, you'd see this thin line with a bunch of dark clouds in it, and you'd think there was nothing there. If all you looked at, if you look towards the center of the Milky Way galaxy, see that swath of space that some of us can see if we go out in the desert.

46:37If you just thought that that was the only...

46:40Neil deGrasse Tyson:Some of us could see. Yeah. Remaining 3 % of the population of the world. Where there's no extra light pollution. Right? If we thought there was nothing there, we'd miss out on so much information about this galaxy. But if we looked at the infrared, we see so much going on. Right? Never mind UV and gamma. There's so much more to the galaxy than meets the eye. So too is there's so much more to these girls than meets the eye. And we want them to have that ownership of that star, that planet, that galaxy that they're studying so that when they continue on and the heavy math comes in, they'd be less likely to leave the field because they think, oh, you know, I didn't get that question right on that test.

47:26I didn't know someone told me that, you know, I shouldn't be here. Right. Just knowing that there's a connection that they have between what they're learning and who they are that we hope will really help them stay.

47:39Neil deGrasse Tyson:Cool. All right, let's see if we can slip in two more questions, Chuck. All right, well, here's one from Carrie Manaberg. And Carrie says, hi, Dr. Shields. Is there any scientific evidence that life on Earth came here from an interaction with a comet or asteroid that had biological foundation chemicals? Ooh. Ooh, this is a popular question within the astrobiology community. I believe the term for this is panspermia. Yes. Right? That something comes in from elsewhere and like seeds us. Seeds us. Yeah. Yeah. It's, I mean, of course it's possible. I don't think it's being given very much funding, to be honest, in terms of exploration of this topic.

48:26But it certainly has been discussed within astrobiology communities. Okay. Okay. All right. Okay. This is Jason. He says, hello, Dr. Shields. Do you have any personal moral quandaries about science moving forward? or is pretty much just forget morals and let's just see how far we can go. Now, I don't know if Jason is making an indictment of any sort or not. That's a very specific question.

48:55Neil deGrasse Tyson:It's starting out with the premise that all scientists are immoral. Yeah, basically. But I think I know what he means. It's like scientists want to discover. What if you and you too, Neil, had the opportunity to make a discovery that would enlighten, but there was a larger chance that it would destroy? Would you still expose that discovery? That's a moral quandary. Yeah, this is an important question. This harkens back to the last episode that I was fortunate enough to be on with you, where we talked about terraforming and we talked about some of the moral and ethical implications of that question of, is it okay to terraform another planet or terraform Mars?

49:46I do think that as scientists, ethics must be key. So I don't subscribe to the view that science and discovery at all costs. There's a piece that I've written for an upcoming a periodical that's like, you know, why do this? Why look for life elsewhere? Why spend billions of dollars doing all of this? And is that object, Oumuamua, that first interstellar object, you know, is that, you know, is it really an alien's craft or is it, you know, is it just, can it be explained by regular scientific method. I think what it comes down to is if we go, and I'm talking about this in the context of the search for life elsewhere, there's all sorts of other genetics and questions about cloning and all of that that have their own ethical implications.

50:43But from my part of the sphere on that question, if we were to discover that we are not alone, what would we do with that information? Would we have to go and visit? Or could we stay on our planet and know that we're not alone and let that information inform how we think and feel and move throughout the world? Or would we need to go? And if we would need to go and visit, could we just go and visit and then come back home? Or would we need to stay? And if we needed to stay, could we just stay and not try to conquer? Or would we have to go the way that and emulate what was done on our planet with Columbus and Magellan and all the rest and the implications of that, right, that led to genocide?

51:39I would hope that we would be able to learn from the lessons of the past and not repeat them. And that really is what I think it all comes back to is hope. You know, I have no clear answer about what other scientists might do, and maybe even what I might do if given the opportunity to go to another world and communicate with other, you know, other species. But I carry with me the hope that I would want to do whatever we do from a place of love, kindness, inclusivity, and welcome, and humility, to be honest. So that I think is the key. To be a scientist, I must concede that there is more out there that can be explained and I can hold on to that humility and allow that to guide to serve as a North Star for me morally.

52:38So. Well, that is beautiful. As a comedian, let me just say this. That ain't happening.

52:46Neil deGrasse Tyson:That is not what is going to happen. Well, but I got two reactions. One, how charming it was that you thought we would go find aliens on another planet and that we might exploit them. That's just... Oh, rather than like Independence Day and they're going to come and kill us? Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And believe me, if we go see them, they're not answering the door. They're going to play the role just like we Jehovah's Witnesses or something. They're like, they're here. Right. Don't let them... We're not... Get away from the window. But that question... Get away from the window. I've never had heard anyone talk about an encounter with aliens and talk about we exploiting them.

53:27Neil deGrasse Tyson:That is like never... I don't know any storyline. If you're thinking of that storyline, that is completely beautiful. That's a beautiful thing. But of course it mirrors what happened on our planet. I mean, how could I not think of it that way? You know why I think about it? I think if they come here and they do what we do to each other... Oh, Lord. as we portray in the films, then we're creating them not based on a supposition of how they would behave, but on actual knowledge of how we did behave. So in fact, all of the alien movies are mirrors to our culture as you... Treating it almost like a guidebook or a recipe.

54:09Yes, yes.

54:11Neil deGrasse Tyson:And I couldn't help, you have to publish a paper on the interstellar visitor, Amuamua. So we have Aumawa. I know it's so close to my name. We need that research paper. I write it. I write in the book, I say, Umuamua. It sounds like my name. Yeah, that's great. Aumawa studies Amuamua. That's right. But Amuamua is Hawaiian. And Aumawa, does that have some origins? My parents made it up. They made up vowel sounds. They put together their musicians. They made a chant up. But yeah, that sounds... I went to Hawaii once. They sounded like hippies. Yes. They sounded like some leftover hippies right there.

54:50Very nice.

54:51Neil deGrasse Tyson:Very nice. Well, at least you weren't named Moon Unit. Okay. Right. Or Moon Beam. Or Pilot Inspector. I mean, come on. That's unfortunate. But yeah, Oumuamua means messenger from afar, arriving first. Yes, the first messenger. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So, guys, we got to end it there. That's sad. Oh, my gosh. This is good. This has been fantastic. Thanks for being on, and congratulations again. Thank you so much, Neil. And thank you, Chuck. It's great to be here. All right. Chuck, good to have you, man. Always a pleasure. All right. I'm Neil deGrasse Tyson. You're a personal astrophysicist for StarTalk.

55:28As always, I bid you to keep looking up.

55:43From the world and creators of The Big Bang Theory comes a new Max original comedy series, Stuart, Fails to Save the Universe. After accidentally creating a new multiverse, comic store owner Stuart Bloom must locate a quantum interference device to restore reality. Executive producers Chuck Lorre, Zach Penn and Bill Prady deliver the adventure of a lifetime. Catch the new Max original comedy series streaming Thursdays at 9pm exclusively on HBO Max. Subscription required. You've never been one to settle, stand down or stand still. You're a lifelong learner, energized by excellence. There's a fire inside you, you can't ignore.

56:26You've got competition to outrun, momentum to build on and your own high standards to meet. Stop now, not a chance. At Capella University, we help you catch what you're chasing because you've always had the drive. Now, go earn the degree. Capella University. What can't you do? Visit capella.edu to learn more.