If we have the power to turn another planet into Earth, then we have the power to turn Earth back into Earth.

And extracting one molecule's signature in spectral analysis from the rest of the signatures is hard work, sort of like picking out the sound of your toddler's voice in a roomful of screaming children during playtime. It's hard, but you can do it.

The greatest explorer of recent decades is not even human.

The universe for me was other planets and other star systems and other galaxies. I enjoyed tracking it, but it had no specific influence on my ambitions for that reason. It wasn't really far enough away from Earth to matter to me.

Publicly and among themselves biologists rightly celebrate the diversity of life on Earth... At the end of the day, however, their confession is heard by no one: they work with a single scientific sample-life on Earth.

I knew Pluto was popular among elementary schoolkids, but I had no idea they would mobilize into a 'Save Pluto' campaign. I now have a drawer full of hate letters from hundreds of elementary schoolchildren (with supportive cover letters from their science teachers) pleading with me to reverse my stance on Pluto. The file includes a photograph of the entire third grade of a school posing on their front steps and holding up a banner proclaiming, 'Dr. Tyson - Pluto is a Planet!'

With ticket prices, do you ask yourself, why I'm paying $70 to see the arts? You say, "No, that's what the symphony is costing me."