It's quite literally true that we are star dust, in the highest exalted way one can use that phrase. ...I bask in the majesty of the cosmos. I use words, compose sentences that sound like the sentences I hear out of people that had revelation of Jesus, who go on their pilgrimages to Mecca.
Neil deGrasse TysonCivilization just takes it as a given that the whole world was flooding. Then science came and you had geology and modern astrophysics, and time became well understood going back billions of years. So enlightened religious people, as a necessity, had to shed the magical elements of the Bible. A little known fact is that Thomas Jefferson did just that. There's something called the Jefferson Bible. It's not widely publicized because it sort of conflicts with certain people's ideas of what the founding fathers were.
Neil deGrasse TysonI don't want to go back into space for military reasons, but the economic driver still remains. And so it's a matter of people understanding how that economic driver is revealed with healthy investments on the space frontier.
Neil deGrasse TysonWhy can't we summon the ingenuity and courage of the generations that came before us? The dinosaurs never saw that asteroid coming. What's our excuse?
Neil deGrasse TysonThey all knew the mothership was coming, they all knew it was a flying saucer, they all knew it came from another planet through the vacuum of space. And so what do they do, to the left of that monument? They set up runway lights. And I'm thinking, if you could travel through the vacuum of space, you don't need runway lights. Runway lights are if you're using air for lift. Aliens would not need air for lift.
Neil deGrasse Tyson