Neil deGrasse Tyson: "Adventures of an Astrophysicist" [11/11]

Recorded 2011/05/12 during Tyson's lecture at the University of Washington entitled "Adventures of an Astrophysicist"

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• neil
• degrasse
• tyson

[Bodywrecker]

I had to watch this one twice.

This is exactly why Neil Tyson has been my biggest role model and inspiration - without his very illicit words of wisdom and amazing public speeches, I wouldn't be working on an internship with NASA right now.

[nickperri]

... and that's the cosmic perspective.

[00Billy]

@a3th3r

cool thank you... done a bunch of sailing...lol

[a3th3r]

@00Billy the boat moves a a certain speed, and the wave pushes the boat at a certain speed which is added to the original, the water is moving, the material of the boat isn't affected, only its speed.

[a3th3r]

@00Billy No, the ruler doesn't change length. It's the empty space which is stretching, the matter contained within it isn't altered. Think of a boat being pushed by a wave.

[00Billy]

@a3th3r

okay another way of asking.... does a one metre ruler change length depending where you are in the universe. Levels of expansion present locally

[a3th3r]

@00Billy I have no clue what you're trying to say.

[00Billy]

@a3th3r

so hypothetically, you get into a spaceship now and go outrace the light waves from the big bang. you need to go 10% further than newton 'would say' due to expansion? Leaving Einstein out of it as much as possible...

[PsychoLynchy]

where is number 11?

[deathwatch1980]

@Bodywrecker good for you! here is hoping that they get a upgrade too what .01 or .015 of the us tax so NASA can go back doing fun and intresting things again

[a3th3r]

@apmechev adding to this, the answer to the question that follows: "if the universe is 13.x billion years old, how can the the observable universe occupy a greater radius than this?" The answer is that space is expanding in addition to the expansion of the universe. Space is stretching while the universe expands at the speed of light, meaning that it's effectively expanding faster than the speed of light. This accounts for the discrepancy between the size of the observable universe and its age.

[a3th3r]

He's brilliant, obviously, but his style of presentation is a little over the top and distracting for me. I prefer my lectures to be far more densely packed, I just think of how much more interesting information he could've fit in if he trimmed some of the jokes / rants or even just worked on his pacing a bit. I think it's probably meant to be as accessible as possible, but for me I want more information and less jokes. A bit of humour is nice, but he could scale it back quite a bit IMO.