jan korbel

Neil deGrasse Tyson on CNN’s Fareeed Zakaria GPS

I think it’s because the – when you stop moving a frontier, you forget what’s on the other side of that frontier that could titillate explorers, the explorer gene built within us. But on top of that, that can actually transform how we live and what we know of the physical world. And it’s the fact that we have explored since we’ve left the cave that has enabled civilization to be what it is.

The people talking on their cell phone and following GPS instructions to where grandma’s house is saying I don’t need space – excuse me, that’s how you know where grandma lives, and when to make the left turn. There’s DirecTV, there is satellite radio, there’s all these things that involve space, and you’re going to say now that we don’t need anymore space? There’s nothing else I need?

There’s a whole universe! And I as an astrophysicist, see the universe, feel the universe, smell the universe every day. Every day. And for people to say, I’m cool, I’m right here, it’s all I need. Now let’s live. I say that’s how to die. That’s not how to live.