Neil deGrasse Tyson

Astrophysicist

1958-10-05

American astrophysicist and science communicator. He serves as director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York and has hosted and produced science programming and media. He is widely known for public education work in astronomy.

Quotes by Neil deGrasse Tyson

You know that passage in the Bible that says, "And the meek shall inherit the Earth"? Always wondered if that was mistranslated. Perhaps it actually says, —And the geek shall inherit the Earth.
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Some molecules - ammonia, carbon dioxide, water - show up everywhere in the universe, whether life is present or not. But others pop up especially in the presence of life itself. Among the biomarkers in Earth's atmosphere are ozone-destroying chlorofluorocarbons from aerosol sprays, vapor from mineral solvents, escaped coolants from refrigerators and air conditioners, and smog from the burning of fossil fuels. No other way to read that list: sure signs of the absence of intelligence.
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... and I submit to you, that science, scientific discovery, especially cosmic discovery, does not become mainstream until the artist embraces the fruits of those discoveries.
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Don't know if it's good or bad that a Google search on "Big Bang Theory" lists the sitcom before the origin of the Universe
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I fear living a life where I could have accomplished something and didn't. That's what I fear. I don't fear death.
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What we do know, and what we can assert without further hesitation, is that he universe had a beginning. The universe continues to evolve. And yes, every one of our body's atoms is traceable to the big bang and to the thermonuclear furnaces within high-mass stars that exploded more than five billion years ago. We are stardust brought to life, then empowered by the universe to figure itself out - and we have only just begun.
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People who believe they are ignorant of nothing have neither looked for, nor stumbled upon, the boundary between what is known and unknown in the universe.
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These philosophically fun ideas usually satisfy nobody. Nonetheless, they remind us that ignorance is the natural state of mind for a research scientist. People who believe they are ignorant of nothing have neither looked for, nor stumbled upon, the boundary between what is known and unknown in the universe.
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Once upon a time, people identified the god Neptune as the source of storms at sea. Today we call these storms hurricanes.... The only people who still call hurricanes acts of God are the people who write insurance forms.
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The good thing about the laws of physics is that they require no law enforcement agencies to maintain them
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There are more stolen bikes in my garage than there are stars in the galaxy.
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During our brief stay on planet Earth, we owe ourselves and our descendants the opportunity to explore - in part because it's fun to do. But there's a far nobler reason. The day our knowledge of the cosmos ceases to expand, we risk regressing to the childish view that the universe figuratively and literally revolves around us. In that bleak world, arms-bearing, resource-hungry people and nations would be prone to act on their 'low contracted prejudices.' And that would be the last gasp of human enlightenment - until the rise of a visionary new culture that could once again embrace, rather than fear, the cosmic perspective.
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We are stardust brought to life, then empowered by the universe to figure itself out— and we have only just begun.
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The gravitational waves of the first detection were generated by a collision of black holes in a galaxy 1.3 billion light-years away, and at a time when Earth was teeming with simple, single-celled organisms. While the ripple moved through space in all directions, Earth would, after another 800 million years, evolve complex life, including flowers and dinosaurs and flying creatures, as well as a branch of vertebrates called mammals. Among the mammals, a sub-branch would evolve frontal lobes and complex thought to accompany them. We call them primates. A single branch of these primates would develop a genetic mutation that allowed speech, and that branch— Homo Sapiens— would invent agriculture and civilization and philosophy and art and science. All in the last ten thousand years. Ultimately, one of its twentieth-century scientists would invent relativity out of his head, and predict the existence of gravitational waves. A century later, technology capable of seeing these waves would finally catch up with the prediction, just days before that gravity wave, which had been traveling for 1.3 billion years, washed over Earth and was detected.Yes, Einstein was a badass.
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The Universe was opaque until 380.000 years after the Big Bang.
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...people taking the time and energy to ask about what they do not understand - I have renewed hope that society can shed its superstitions and embrace the enlightenment that comes from just a basic understanding of how the universe works.
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When asked about which scientist he'd like to meet, Neil deGrasse Tyson said, Isaac Newton. No question about it. The smartest person ever to walk the face of this earth. The man was connected to the universe in spooky ways. He discovered the laws of motion, the laws of gravity, the laws of optics. Then he turned 26.
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There's as many atoms in a single molecule of your DNA as there are stars in the typical galaxy. We are, each of us, a little universe.
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I want to put on the table, not why 85% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences reject God, I want to know why 15% of the National Academy don't.
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When scientifically investigating the natural world, the only thing worse than a blind believer is a seeing denier.
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