Project Hail Mary with Andy Weir

20:37if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with EBCLIS. Before starting EBCLIS, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Ask your doctor about EBCLIS and visit ebglis.lily.com or call 1-800-LILY-RX or 1-800-545-5979. Prime Day is June 23rd through the 26th. These deals are so appealing like portable steamers for steaming. Whoa, did I just sing Soprano? I think I'm breaking into song. Shop Epic deals on air fryers, vacuums, and skincare. I can't stop saying... Shop Epic deals this Prime Day, June 23rd through the 26th. Ooh, I think that's it.

21:17Nope, there's more. Luggage, smart glasses. This is Ken the Nerd Neck Zibera from Michigan, and I support StarTalk on Patreon. This is StarTalk Radio with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

21:41Neil deGrasse Tyson:It looks like a pile of rocks, an animated pile of rocks, but the appendages move in a crab-like way. Well, he has five legs or arms, they can use them interchangeably, that each end in three claws. And so it's pentagonally symmetrical, you might say. and he doesn't actually move specifically like a crab. He walks on those legs, but he can walk on three of them while holding stuff with two of them or he can walk on two of them even if he needs to. I learned in the wiki fan page of your book. Oh, excellent. An undeniable source of absolute truth. Oh, yeah. And I hadn't thought about it and I read this before I saw a preview of your film.

22:27Neil deGrasse Tyson:The creature does not have a front or a back. Right. Because it has, so the way it does its echolocation is it has, I call them oracles, but they're basically like all over his body are just like we have nerve endings for touch. Right. He has nerve endings for sound. And so his body shape, his brain untangles all that information. Like an octopus. He knows his body shape and, yeah. Like an octopus, yeah. He knows his body shape and his position. Like an iridian might reach out his arm to get a better view of something. He's like, wait, let me hear this a little better. Okay. Yeah. It's like this.

23:02That's his way of doing that. And also, wouldn't it be neat if you could just go like this, and the room gets brighter for a second? You could be like, you know, because that's how that works. Because of that, they have a constant input of their 3D environment, constantly going on in all directions. There has to be some sound somewhere for that to be the case. That's true, but there's always ambient sound. Yes, okay. It's wind or whatever, and if they don't have any, they can make some, right? Right. Right. But so they have this constant input of their 3D environment. So they don't have the part of their brain that we have that maintains cognition of what's around us.

23:40Spatially, yeah. So you're looking at me, but you know what's behind you. Right. And your brain, you don't have to think about it. Your brain's just keeping track of that. Right. You know there's a bookshelf there. And in a way, you can see it in your mind. You know where it is. Right.

23:50Neil deGrasse Tyson:And if I turn around and it's not there, I'll notice it's not there. You'll notice it's not there. They don't have that part of a brain. they don't have to track that because they constantly have 360 degree input right it's like if you had eyes all the way around your head that's pretty brilliant now if they suddenly can't hear anything they will lose all of that information right if you close your eyes you still know pretty much everything that's going on well no but in addition to that you just close your eyes you know where everything is in the room yeah i mean not precisely and you probably bump into stuff but you know there's a table there a microphone here a chair here bookshelves Neil's desk, Neil you.

24:23But why wouldn't they be able to do the same thing we do? Because when we close our eyes, we have lost the input, but what we're doing is recreating it in our mind. But your mind has a whole system of maintaining a 3D model of your environment because you can't look at it all the time. I understand what you're saying. Because our minds are acclimated to always tracking what's around us. And persisting it. If we didn't have that, when that would be taken away, would be lost immediately, because they don't need to do that. Basically, they don't have object permanence. Yeah, this is that famous test with infants.

25:00Neil deGrasse Tyson:Yeah. It's a famous test. That's the object. The object's still there when it goes behind the wall. And until a certain age, it goes behind the wall and then they just look somewhere else. It's gone. And then after a certain age, they'll look and they'll anticipate it coming out the other side. That's why peekaboo is so effective with infants. You vanish from reality. It's still effective with Chuck. I was gonna say, I still like it. Chuck's still working on object permanence. Well, they do have object permanence. Iridians, if something leaves their sensory input, they do. But they don't have that spatial map in their heads.

25:30Neil deGrasse Tyson:Okay. Richard Dawkins thinks that bats that use echolocation, being mammals, that means they're structurally similar to us in important ways. He thinks they might use echolocation and map colors onto it. Interesting. He thinks they might be able to, because they have the capacity to think of color. why not add color to to a painted object I mean why not why not yeah I mean you know the only way we'll know is to ask a bat ask a bat right what color is this exactly well one thing I saw interestingly is they took a they took a thing you know how your the cones in your eye react to different wavelengths so there's red and green and blue cones and there's overlap and stuff like that well there are some there are some activations that never happen because like any wavelength that's this, you know, any wavelength in this range will activate your greens a little bit and your blues a little bit and stuff like that.

26:28And so what they did for the hell of it, I think, was they took somebody, they took human test subjects and shined lasers into their eyes to just activate the blue cones. And so now their brain is getting a signal that has just blue cone activation and no green cone activation. and that makes a new color because they have never experienced that in their life. And they have a hard time describing it. They say it's like this really, really brilliant bright blue, which should surprise no one. But it's interesting. Imagine being able to go in and have somebody shoot a laser in your eye and see a color you have never seen, nor will you ever see again because it can only be done by specifically activating those.

27:08We are way off topic.

27:11Neil deGrasse Tyson:No, I love me some color. Color is good. No, I love me some color. So, through your pen, through your mind, the main character names this life form Rocky. Rocky, because he looks like a rock. He looks like a bunch of rocks. Very imagined. Okay. Then, it took me a half second. I want to alert people of this so that they don't lose this half second. Everyone on Rocky's planet is facing the same fate as people from Earth. Ah. And they both notice this one star that is not dimming. Aha. And they got to find out what's going on there and not over here. Gotcha. So they both arrive at the same star for the same purpose with the same mission.

27:53Oh, my God.

27:54Neil deGrasse Tyson:And what an alignment that is. It is. Yeah, very cool. It's like Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks at the Empire State Building. He asks Rocky, is there someone back at home? Yeah. Okay. And Rocky goes, Adrian. Well. And you can't understand. Understand. Really? And so, okay. I'll call you Rocky, and I'll call your mate Adrian. Adrian. Okay. But that's very pop culture. Very pop culture. Retro. Decade. Decades. I'm from Philly. It's totally fine. We love it. It's 50 years ago. I am decades retro. Yes. Wow. Yes, so am I. I am also from 50 years ago. As for Philly, here's the thing. I wanted to do this as part of the publicity, but I came up with the idea too late.

28:44Everyone agrees it would have been a great idea.

28:46Neil deGrasse Tyson:We didn't say what's going on in case you don't know. Rocky, the movie with Sylvester Stallone. Yes. And he's from Philadelphia. Correct. And his wife's name is Adrian. And his wife's name is Adrian. We all know that because there's a big scene where it's Adrian. But I wanted, from the marketing, I wanted them to either CG render or have the puppeteers do it to show Rocky from Project Hail Mary running up the steps of the Art Museum in Philadelphia. Yeah, the Art Museum in Philadelphia. That would have been great. And put his little put his appendages up, you know. And everything like that. Why not?

29:17Because I came up with it. It would have been, it would have taken too long and cost too much at the point that I came up with it. And it would have been stupid.

29:24Neil deGrasse Tyson:Okay. It would have been stupid. It would have been stupid. What are you talking about? That's the first thing people do when they go to Philly is run up those damn stairs. How are you getting Rocky to Philly? How you get what? Through astrophage propulsion. Stupid. Come on, man! Duh. They did little things where they, you know, CGI put like Rocky on the red carpet for the London premiere and he's like signing autographs. Oh, okay. That's cool, that's cool. That's cool. You got it. So one thing that I didn't quite follow precisely, how, by what means and mechanism was the lead character, of course played by?

30:03Neil deGrasse Tyson:Ken. Ken. You know what? I can't think of his name now. Ryan Gosling. By Ryan Gosling. Thank you. So he sets up his computer to, there's initially a shared vocabulary. They start with science and symbols and things. And then that rapidly becomes full on exchange of translated knowledge. So I didn't quite follow how that got so effective so quickly. Well, it's just he had his computer, like, be able to analyze the waveforms. And so Rocky would say a word. The acoustic waveforms, yeah. The acoustic waveforms that Rocky's making. And it would say a word, and then he'd put that in his program and say this, and this is the word, like, hello.

30:50And then when the computer heard something close enough to that, it would then have a synthesizer voice say hello to be Rocky's voice. and Rocky is not speaking poetic very high end he's talking like real simple words for dumb human he's speaking sort of a pigeon, iridian English hybrid thing to try to keep the words simple and keep the sentence structure simple so that they can each talk to each other but there had to be some starter exchange of vocabulary and they started with I think the number one Yeah, this is my number one. One. One. So what do you say for one? Okay, cool. Two. Two. Okay.

31:34You know. Okay, that's cool. That works. So I - Oh, and by the way, since you're talking about Rocky and Adrian, I'm surprised. Did you notice that the name of the ship is the Hail Mary, and it's full of - It better be Grace, but - Grace.

31:47Neil deGrasse Tyson:Yeah. Whoa. The main character's name is Dr. Ryland Grace. Oh. The Hail Mary is full of grace. I could not resist it. Whoa. I am weak. I'm weak, Neil. I'm weak. But is the Lord with thee? Well, the writer would be the Lord, right, in this case. Okay. I guess so. I'm hilarious. I guess so. There you go. But are you blessed art thou? I don't want to know anything about the fruit of your womb. That's all I'm saying. That's all I'm saying. Blessed art thou among women. Let me ask you this, though, because you seem to have this theme of alone in space. Oh. What? is it that fascinates you about alone in the cosmos?

32:33Well, to be fair, Ryland is not alone, right? He's got his brother from a rocky mother with him, right? But failing that, it's just a very convenient method of storytelling. You have your hero is like completely isolated when they're out in space. It's like, even if all of humanity wanted to help him, which was the case of the Martian, there's very little they can do. So the lead character in this story is,

33:02Neil deGrasse Tyson:he's kind of a reluctant hero. To say the least. He's kind of a selfish coward. I wouldn't say selfish. He doesn't want to save the world. He doesn't want, and yet he's cast into this spot kind of against his will. Reminding me of the great Shakespearean line. Yes. Some people are born great. Some people achieve greatness. Other people have greatness thrust upon them. He had it thrust into him. It was not a good spirit. He had greatness just absolutely injected into him. Injected into him. He was a reluctant participant in this mission. Right. But everyone knew they needed him. So they just drugged him and put him on.

33:44Yeah. That's a pretty big spoiler, by the way, for the movie. So you might want to make an extra warning. Okay. And the book also. But yes, he was there against his will. And I wanted to make a likable protagonist. and it's, I think we can all feel like we've all felt at times that we are like unqualified, unwilling, and scared. I don't know, maybe not you. You just radiate confidence. But for the rest of us morals.

34:11Neil deGrasse Tyson:But that's not interesting to a viewer. You want the person to overcome these weaknesses. Which he does. And then triumph. Yeah. Yeah. Which he does. Yeah. Okay. All right. I mean, that always redeems a character too. Yeah. So he can start off scared, cowardly, but then overcomes that to do heroic feats. Right. Especially if they're selfless heroic feats. Right. I mean, the first time he was willing to really risk his neck was because of the friendship he had made with Rocky. Oh, okay. That's cool, man. That's cool. So he didn't want to save humanity, but he put his ass on the line for some Rocky-ass alien.

34:47Yeah. Yeah. Now I'm pissed off. Now I'm angry. Within the context, Saving Humanity was a guaranteed death sentence. It was a suicide mission. Gotcha. Saving Rocky was high risk of death. It was a little different.

35:04Neil deGrasse Tyson:Okay. That's an interesting distinction. I like the distinction. Yeah. High risk of death or certain death. Certain death. Yeah. I'm taking the high risk. Yeah.

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36:34Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with EPCLESS. Before starting EPCLESS, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Ask your doctor about EPCLESS and visit ePCLESS.lily.com or call 1-800-LILY-RX or 1-800-545-5979. Prime Day is June 23rd through the 26th. These deals are so appealing like portable steamers for steaming. Whoa, did I just sing soprano? I think I'm breaking into song. Epic deals on air fryers, There's vacuums and skin care. I can't stop seeing. Shop Epic Deals this Prime Day, June 23rd through the 26th.

37:15I think that's it. Nope, there's more. Luggage, smart glasses.

37:32Neil deGrasse Tyson:So I want to just compliment you on conceiving of aliens that are not just actors in a suit. Yeah. So therefore, you have the freedom for them to not be humanoid. Right. Which is one of the weakest points of all Hollywood aliens. Well, to be fair, Hollywood aliens are usually not in$200 million movies, right? And so you've got to be realistic. Is that what your movie cost? Yeah. $200 million? Actually closer to$250, but we got tax rebates from the UK for shooting there. Wow. Nice. Yeah, we better make a lot of money on this. That's why he's got an expensive Panama hat. That's why he's got this expensive Panama hat.

38:12So half of that budget went to this. All right. but yeah most of the time you know if you're going to write a science fiction story and you want to tell it in a reasonable budget like an episode of Star Trek or something like that

38:26Neil deGrasse Tyson:you get the rubber costume you get the yeah you get the forehead prosthetics you have the alien be in the same environment you're good but yeah with the luxury of being able to do whatever you want we can have our alien require you know xenonite barriers you know and stuff like that and be completely non-humanoid tell me about the barriers because your alien requires a different environment. 29 atmospheres of ammonia. 29 atmospheres. A lot of pressure and ammonia. And a lot of heat. That's right. Hot, high pressure, and poisonous gases. Yep. So, sounds a lot like me and Melania. And it went sorry.

39:03Go ahead.

39:03Neil deGrasse Tyson:So, how do you... After a lot of tacos. How that the boundary between the regular spaceship and the alien in the spaceship. What was that? It was transparent. It was made of xenonite, which is a material that is somehow one of the main components of it is xenon, a noble gas that doesn't normally react to things. What I wanted... It makes super bright headlights. Yes. So Ryland has no idea how that stuff works or how it's made. Oh, so it's a rocky alloy. Yeah, it's iridian technology. Okay. And so what I wanted was, I didn't want either species to be like completely scientifically more advanced than the other.

39:48From the Iridians' point of view, we're kind of the advanced aliens because we have computers, we have better technology across the board, but Iridians have much better materials technology. So they're material scientists, basically. Yeah, their material science is far better than ours. But our, like, they didn't understand relativity. The Iridians didn't. Those idiots. They didn't understand. We've only

40:10Neil deGrasse Tyson:known it for about 120 years so don't get so high in my knee so why was it important that they didn't know we figured out flight before we figured out relativity okay so why was it important that they did not know relativity as a storyteller because it gave me an excuse to if you calculate if you assume newtonian physics which they did they calculated how much fuel they would need to get from their home star 48 ordani to tau seti and and and for a trip back it was supposed to be a round trip thing um and you calculate that fuel you get a certain number the real amount of fuel you need to use is considerably less due to the time dilation and the relativistic effects you have when you're going there so he ended up with a whole bunch of excess fuel which enables him there i didn't catch that yeah there it is yeah and so that's the evidence they didn't know relativity others they would have done the proper calculation right right and rocky it's in the book but not in the movie, Rocky says they were very confused.

41:07It's like, okay, the planet was, you know, the other star was closer than it should be, so we slowed down, but then it got further away. Oh, so they're experiencing relativity,

41:17Neil deGrasse Tyson:not knowing what the hell is going on. What is going on? Wow. So do you regret that that wasn't in the movie? No, you had to cut things out. Yeah, so what, okay, because you don't have final edit control, I presume, because you're just the author. Well, I'm also a producer, so I had to say. What were you, executive producer? No, I was a real producer. Oh! Wow. So is there a scene you felt should have been in the movie? Yeah, my only regret, and Drew and I both fought for this. Drew wrote the adaptation for it. I saw it. He credited him for that. Drew with the full name? Drew Goddard. Drew Goddard.

41:52Drew Goddard wrote the adaptation, did a fantastic job. And he and I both wanted this one scene, and we just didn't have time for it because the runtime was going so long. But there's a scene in the book where they nuke Antarctica. They basically put... Back on Earth, yeah. On Earth. They set off a bunch of nuclear explosions in Antarctica to make an entire ice shell fall into the ocean so that it will melt and release all the methane, which is greenhouse gases, so that Earth will retain more of the heat that it is getting from the sun.

42:19Neil deGrasse Tyson:Because they are... Because the astrophage is eating the sun. Dimming the sun. Dimming the sun. So, wow. So they're like, we need some global warming. Wow. And that's why... Are you doing Trump? Is that it? And that's why I'm... There's a thing between Trump and Fat Albert. It's somewhere, hey, hey, hey, man. I think there's something wrong with your ears. No, no. You're a pretty gravelly Trump, my friend. No, if you've listened to him now, that's how he talks. Oh, yeah, okay. So I'm not doing rally Trump. I'm doing the Trump that talks in front of the cameras and wants you to know that, quite frankly.

43:01Neil deGrasse Tyson:So that's something that was not in the film where we don't see Earth descending into. Right. And that's also not in the book. We see in the beginnings of it in the book, there's issues. They're starting to have problems. And a lot of their problems are caused by the amelioration techniques they're proactively doing. So they nuke in. Things are going to get worse, but then we're going to need that heat. So we have a mouse problem. Well, let's get a bunch of hawks. Now we have a hawk problem. Okay. Exactly. That's the deal. All right, and it was a stretch for me, if I may. You and I are enemies now.

43:42It was a stretch for me as an academic

43:46Neil deGrasse Tyson:to completely embrace the idea that the entire world of biochemists is insufficient to handle this mission and they need the one guy who has the expertise that no one else has and he's a middle school chemistry teacher. Right. So to be fair, he was a speculative xenobiologist. He is a PhD, astrobiologist. So he had done that and then he'd left that field. He'd written papers. But he wrote papers, so the papers are out there and other people are still active. Right. And he's no longer active. Right. So why does he still become the guy? Because he's been part of the mission and the mission planning the whole time.

44:33So he understands all the other aspects of the mission as well. He knows all about the Hail Mary itself. And they don't have time to train someone else up on all the other stuff. And he's as well trained as any of the other biologists. In the way they need it to be. In the field that they need him to be.

44:49Neil deGrasse Tyson:Okay. He got out of that one. Does that work for you? He got out of that one. I got wriggled out of that one. So again, congratulations. Thanks so much. On some of your books getting turned into movie. two out of three some of your books getting turned into movies and it's a delight anytime you come visit us here and for whatever might be your next book still we want to stay on your tour your tour list always alright, excellent thank you, thanks for having me and any last bits of wisdom or advice for us all how about aspiring writers I've got three bits of advice for aspiring writers one, you have to actually write ideating and imagining and world building is not writing you need to type uh number two is resist the execute the idea yeah yeah number two is resist the urge to tell your friends and family your story right it satisfies your need for an audience and saps your will to write oh very nice so you you can you can give them a chapter at a time as you write it to satisfy that need don't tell them don't tell them okay and then the third one is there's never been a better time in human history to self-publish there's no old boy network between you and the readers anymore You can, for absolutely zero financial risk, you can put your book out there and millions of people have access to it.

46:03Neil deGrasse Tyson:Says the man who's published with Penguin Random House. I was going to say. Who initially published on Kindle Direct Publishing. Oh! But for all of you who aren't this talented, don't quit your job. I didn't quit my job until I had a traditional publishing deal with Penguin. All right. All right. We're done here. That was Project Hail Mary. Nice. Full of grace. Yeah. The Lord was with me. Well, Phil Lord. Chuck, always good to have you, man. Always a pleasure. Lord, nice. And Andy, thanks for being high up on my compliment list. Oh, thank you. Thank you. And let me give you the highest compliment I could ever give.

46:43Don't stop moving the needle in your storytelling for Hollywood because it was looking like same shit, different day.

46:53Neil deGrasse Tyson:Yeah. For so many years. and with your stories out there, it gives us something fresh to embrace and imbibe. Thanks so much. That means a lot to you. In the genre. Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist, do keep looking up.

47:19Do-do-do-do.

47:22Neil deGrasse Tyson:So, and we got enough here. It's a fun one. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

47:28They say in that song they're going to Venus, and then they also say they have so many light years to go. Oh, God. It pisses me off. What a shame.

47:35Neil deGrasse Tyson:Yeah, don't get me started. Yeah, God damn it. That's awful. No, but you know what I started was the, I did the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs. That's the word. No, no, the Kessel, hey, hey. No, no, don't come after the fact and explain that. No, no, no. At the time, they didn't, there are two black holes orbiting each other. Don't make me slap you. And so if you go between the black holes, Then you manage to do it in under 12 parsecs. Everyone else goes around the black holes. I've heard that explanation before, too. They're just bailing out there. That's what we're doing. Nobody has given me a compliment at all.

48:10I don't know. I don't know, man. Way to escape Philly?

48:20Man, that hurt. That one hurt. eczema is unpredictable but you can flare less with epglyss a once monthly treatment for moderate to severe eczema after an initial four month or longer dosing phase about four in ten people taking epglyss achieved itch relief and clear or almost clear skin at 16 weeks and most of those people maintain skin that's still more clear at one year with monthly dosing epglyss lebrickizumab lbkz a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema.

48:57Also called atopic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies. EBCLIS can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you're allergic to EBCLIS. Allergic reactions can occur that can be severe. Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with EBCLIS. Before starting EBCLIS, Tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Ask your doctor about EBCLIS and visit ebglis.lily.com or call 1-800-LILY-RX or 1-800-545-5979.

49:26Prime Day is June 23rd through the 26th. These deals are so appealing, like portable steamers for steaming. Whoa, did I just sing soprano? I think I'm breaking into song. Epic deals on air fryers, vacuums, and skincare. I can't stop seeing Shop Epic Deals this Prime Day, June 23rd through the 26th I think that's it. Nope, there's more Luggage, smart glasses