The Basement: Avi Loeb | 3I Atlas, Oumuamua, and What NASA Won't Say

Today I'm talking with somebody you. probably know, Professor Avi Lobo. He's. a theoretical physicist at Harvard. He's. the longest serving chair of the. astronomy department in its history. And. he has over a thousand peer-reviewed. papers. He's got nine books. The guy's. resume is absurd. >> A thousand papers. I wrote one letter to. NASA and got put on a watch list. The. system is rigged, human. >> But here's what makes Avi different from. every other Harvard professor. He took. all that credibility and aimed it at the. one question most scientists are afraid. to touch. Are we alone? He's the one who.

said, "Oua Mua, the first interstellar. object we ever detected, [music]. might be an alien light sail." He. dragged a magnet across the bottom of. the Pacific Ocean to recover fragments. of an interstellar meteor. >> That is the most unhitched sentence I've. ever heard, and I'm here for it. >> And right now, his Galileo project is. scanning the skies for unidentified. anomalous phenomena. >> Unidentified anomalous phenomena. That's. a lot of syllabus to avoid saying. aliens, human. >> We get into all of it. his childhood on. a farm in Israel, how he accidentally.

ended up at Harvard because nobody else. wanted the job, what Arrow told him. behind closed doors, and a new threat to. astronomy that nobody's talking about. Let's go down to the basement. [music]. >> Obby, welcome. >> Thanks for having me. >> I'm excited. Um, before we get to the. good stuff, I want to know about how a a. farm boy grows up picking like. collecting chicken eggs, riding. tractors, thinking about philosophy.

Like what is young Avi thinking about on. that farm? What was that like? >> The most fundamental questions about our. existence because I thought, you know, we all die. What's the point? You know. uh if we don't understand why we are. here and what the purpose of our. existence is and what kind of inspiring. themes we should advocate for during our. life then what's the point of living um. you know just think about the fact that. we will all not be here you know in. inund.

years at most um and that's what. fascinated me and I um I was really. interested in the big picture Um but I. at the same time I collected eggs every. afternoon. I had a very strong. connection to nature and um I really. love nature because it's not always kind. to us. Um you know earth itself went. through catastrophes but uh there is. nothing uh you know bad in in in the way.

that nature operates. There is no. intention the way you find with people. And so I really used to go to um the. hills of the village and read philosophy. books there embedded within nature. And. um and then circumstances brought me to. physics. And when I received tenure at. Harvard um I finished my PhD at age 24. because I was in a special program in. the Israeli military that was forced on. me. uh and uh you know I was connected.

to physics even though it wasn't my. preference but it at least allowed me to. think uh rather than um uh use my body. just to carry. uh weapons you know that so I always. preferred thinking and then um one thing. led to another I was tenure at Harvard. and I asked myself okay I'm a professor. in astrophysics. u this is an arranged marriage but I'm. actually married to my true love because. I can pursue the same questions using.

the tools of science. Now, it clearly. makes me very different than my. colleagues cuz um you know I don't care. what they say. I know what the important. questions are and actually frankly the. public knows what they are. It's just. some aberration within academia that. these questions are not being pursued. And I'm not afraid of not being liked. because you know there is a bigger. reward at the end which is let's figure. out something really fundamental. And. this really motivates me and if I were.

to meet my young self I would. immediately connect to that person and. people that knew me back then as a kid. they say I haven't changed much. I was. good in sports. I could have you know I. was offered to be a member of the Delta. Force in Israel. Um, I said, "No, I. prefer to use my head for thinking." Um, and um, today I jog every morning since. co I jog every morning at sunrise 3. miles and in the company of birds, bunnies, ducks, wild turkeys, and it's.

it's wonderful. You know, I I feel much. more um accomplished doing that than any. title that I would get in academia. I. don't really care about that. I don't. care much about money. This doesn't. really attract me. Um, it's really trying to figure out. something important about our existence. that motivates me. >> Well, take us back then cuz you you. skipped a part that I want to hear. about. So, you're on the farm, you're. collecting eggs, you're riding tractors. >> I don't think a lot of people know about. the Tapia program and how selective that.

is. And you got in there when you were. 18 years old. Yes. >> So, what what is that program? What is. what is just what is it like for an. 18-year-old from the farm? The program. was established a year before I joined. it and it was meant to select a group of. between [snorts] 20 and 30 recruits out. of thousands. >> and this is military science program. Yes. >> Yes. So the goal is uh to attract the. very best minds in physics technology so. that they would work on projects that.

are useful for the defense of the. country and um it's very selective. We. went through two days of IQ tests and. other type of tests and uh I was really. surprised that they admitted me I was. good in in physics but I didn't plan a. long-term career in physics and and. there I was and I was better than my uh. the members of my group that year in in.

all physical. abilities. So, you know, I excelled when. we parachuted, drove tanks. I I did. really well. >> You parachuted. >> three times above my home. Yeah. >> Wow. So, you did like a basic training. and all that. >> So, the idea was to train uh those. recruits every year to train them. through all the military, the sections. of the military so that they know what. it's like to be a soldier in in the air. force, in the paratroopers, in the you. know, everywhere. And so, we uh went on.

a ship. We we did um everything that. allows us to basically imagine what. soldier feels like and then um we were. told that we could potentially be. engaged in projects uh research projects. that are useful. Um and I decided no I. don't want to work with companies that. develop. you know means of weapons or means of. defense and uh I prefer to do. fundamental research in physics. that's.

what matters to me. So I went on my own. to uh a place and convinced the people. there to propose a a project that would. involve fundamental physics and could be. potentially useful. And we wrote it on a. napkin and I I typed it in and suggested. it to the leaders of of the program I. was in and they said, "Well, based on. your record being so excellent in the. paratrooper training that we gave you, you know, you were the best. Uh we will.

give you the privilege to be the first. uh to actually conduct fundamental. research in physics which is not geared. immediately towards an application." So. they gave me that privilege for three. months and I uh suggested a project that. was later proposed to the strategic. defense initiative of President Rean and. um and so they were very happy with the. performance. They said okay we can give. this privilege to one person and I was. the first and after that they gave it to.

a few people every year because they saw. it there are some benefits to that and. then at the time General Abramson the. head of the Star Wars by the way it's. called Star Wars it's interesting in. retrospect um he came to Israel and I. gave a presentation I still have the. photo of that presentation um and he. liked it and it appeared in all the. newspapers that this is the first. international project supported by the. SDI, the Star Wars program. And that.

brought me to Washington uh every few. months because we got funded at a few. million dollars a year. >> And you were a project lead on the. propulsion side. Yes, >> I was on the theory side. There was an. experimentalist and the two of us were. leading it. Uh I was just 21 at that. time, 21 years old and visiting. Washington really gave me a perspective. that I didn't have before. And um then. um. >> now hang on. Are you do you understand. at this point that this is not what. normal life is for most people when. they're 18 or 21 jumping out of planes.

and going to Washington? This is not. norm. Did you know this wasn't normal? You're from a farm. >> Yeah. Well, I thought I I have to excel. uh in order to. to become to do what I really wish to do. at the end. So one thing led to another. and it was really surprising because I. met uh the pope of plasma physics at the. time. Plasma physics is the study of hot. gases and and we were using it in our. project. Uh he was the most respected. plasma physicist in the world. Uh his.

name is Marshall Rosenluth and I told. him I'm coming to a visit and. are there any places you know I'm about. to finish this program I became an. officer and so forth. Um where should I. aspire to go? and he said, "Well, I used. to be faculty at the Institute for. Advanced Study at Princeton where. Einstein used to be faculty several. decades earlier." And so he recommended. that I go there. So I wrote a message to. the administrator there and asked her to.

visit at the end of my trip to. Washington. And she said, "Well, you. know, we just don't allow anyone to come. here. Um, send me your CV." And I sent. it and I had 11 publications. and she. said, "Okay, you know what? You can come. over." So, I went there and um she said, "There isn't anyone interested in. speaking to visitors like you here. except for one person that has plenty of. time. That's Freeman Dyson.". >> Freeman Dyson. >> Yes. Wow. Okay. >> Who I recognized from textbooks in.

physics. I said, "Great. That's. amazing." I came to Freeman and he. looked at me and said, "Oh, you're from. Israel. you know, we have a faculty. member who is married to an Israeli and. he loves to brush up his Hebrew, so why. don't I check if he's around and you can. have lunch with him. I said, "Sure. I. never heard about this person. You know, he studies the sun. He's an. astrophysicist." So, that was John Bal. and uh gladly he was there. So we went.

to lunch and he invited me for a. month-long visit a few months later. during which at the end of which he. invited me to his office and said Avi we. would like to offer you a 5-year. fellowship which is the most prestigious. we offer long-term fellowship at the. institute under one condition that. you'll switch to astrophysics and I. didn't know how the sun shines you know. which was embarrassing given that he. dedicated all of his career to to to the. meth you know the the the nutrino.

emitted from burning the hydrogen fuel. in the sun. You know, that was his most. important contribution. Uh and he. nevertheless allowed me the privilege. So I said, "Sure." Uh you know, I can. this is like in the Godfather, an offer. you can't refuse. >> Refused. [laughter]. So I went down the stairs and there came. one of the postocs that were already. there that um um later became the chair. of the astrophysics department at.

Princeton and he looked at me and I said. John just offered me a five-year. fellowship and he said how is that. possible? We're supposed to discuss your. case among many others this afternoon. with John. So then they met and John. said, "What do you think about Avi?" And. uh this person said, "You. already offered him a position. Why are. you asking us?" And John said, "Well, I. want to make sure that I didn't make a. mistake. [laughter].

>> A little too late, John.". >> No, but that was the way he operated. He. basically decided for himself what's the. right thing to do. I cannot do that. today. You know, I'm the director of the. Institute for Theory and Computation. I. have to consult with a committee. >> Are you saying you consult before you. release something? >> I have no option because I cannot make a. decision on my own. Um people will. immediately attack me and I will be. removed from my my position. And on top. of that, I can give you an example uh. that there was a a student from uh India.

that we considered uh who came from. unprivileged background. We considered. last year as a student in in the. astronomy department at Harvard. I was I. I knew about this person because I. communicated with him and extremely. talented, brilliant. But I realized he. doesn't come from a privileged. background. He doesn't have the. education. He had to provide for his. family. So it took a lot of his time. So. I said we should I wrote a letter of. recommendation for him and I said to the.

committee members I said we should admit. this guy because I recognize parts of. myself in him. And the chair of the. committee said no that's too risky. We. will not do that. What's the risk? >> Well, that he might falter, might might. not succeed and and and that would be a. waste of a position and then this person. went elsewhere and now he's being. considered for a faculty position as a. student when he finishes his PhD. He. will he will become a a faculty already. very quickly and so he's brilliant and.

no doubt about it. But it shows you how. things happen right now in academia. often. I wouldn't let it be that way if. I was chair of that committee. But what. John did to me early on was gamble and. um that's what allowed me to come to the. institute for advanced study at. Princeton where I knew nothing about. astrophysics. I was really devastated to. that that nobody pays attention to me. because I don't know uh the fundamental. concepts that they're working on. So it. took me a while to learn the vocabulary.

And as soon as I got that um there was a. position at Harvard that was advertised. and nobody wanted it. >> No one wanted it. >> Nobody wanted it because the chance of. getting tenure at Harvard at the time. was extremely small. The previous person. who was tenured from within was 20 years. earlier. So um people said they offered. it to someone else and that's someone. that they knew he was a postoc at. Harvard. He said, "No, no, no. I I will. go to a faculty position in the.

Netherlands instead because I know that. that there I will get tenured and uh I'm. not risking I'm not wasting my time." Uh. because there were lots of people that. were in this position that didn't get. tenure and they had to go somewhere. else. So he said, "I'll just cut to the. chase and go somewhere else." Uh so they. offered it to me and I said, "I I don't. mind." Again, an offer I cannot decline. I don't mind doing that because I can I. have plan B, which is to go back to the. farm. And frankly, I'm not sure my life. would have been worse on the farm if I. went to go I went back there because of.

the beauty of nature. I would still be. happy. >> Well, who was still back on the farm. when all this was happening? Your. family? >> My father took took care of and my my. mother obviously helped him, but it's. mostly my my father who was a farmer. basically. Um, >> didn't he want you to stay on the farm. and not do any of this? He wanted you to. stay. No, but my mother recognized. throughout my history the importance of. um intellectual pursuits and I used to. speak with her a lot. I was very. connected to her. Uh I had two sisters.

and now I have two daughters and my. wife, a very strong opinionated wife. Uh. and I love being in the company of. brilliant women. You know, it's just the. way I work throughout my career. They. they're much more strategic. Uh and I. enjoy speaking with them. Uh and so um. at the end uh you know uh I ended up not. only at Harvard because nobody wanted it. but then I worked really hard and and.

got an offer from Cornell University. Someone suggested go to Cornell they are. looking for a person uh at a tenure. level and so I went there without. knowing anyone. I didn't sleep that. night but apparently I gave a good talk. so they. offered it to me out of a big pool of. applicants most of which were Americans. and I was a foreigner. So to me it. illustrated. you know this the American way of you. can make it here you know irrespect of.

where you come from. >> Sure. >> Um because why why would they offer it. to me? I have no connections. I don't. know anyone and I'm still you know. untenured at Harvard. Anyway, they did. it. I went to a former dean of the. faculty of arts and sciences at Harvard. And I said, his name is Henry Rosski. I said, Henry, do you think I should accept the Cornell. offer? They will not hold it for me for. more than a month. And Harvard takes 6. months to decide. He said, "No, turn it. down. >> Turn it down.

>> Turn it down." So I stayed at Harvard. and within 6 months they offered me. tenure. I was the first. >> You're about what? 33, 34 years old at. this point. >> Yes. Okay. And that was only 3 years. after I arrived. Actually, less than. that, two and a half years or so. >> Again, this is a seven. Yeah, that's. that's unusual. It usually takes seven. years. Um. >> anyway, so they offered um and I later. went and spoke with Henry. I said, "Why. did you give me this advice? I mean, you. didn't did you know that I will get the. tenure?" And he said, "No, [laughter] I.

didn't know, but I thought it would be. better for Harvard if you stayed.". >> Ah, that's wonderful. So I ended up. being tenured at Harvard after working. really hard and it's not something that. you can just give up. Uh so I decided. not to go and of course I got a lot of. other offers as soon as that happened. but I stayed there. Um and um you know I. have a very stable uh situation. I'm. anchored in a very um constructive way.

over there. I had maybe 50 students and. hundreds of postocs that I worked with, published more than a thousand. scientific papers, wrote nine books and. I basically um in a very healthy. situation and that allows me this. confidence that it cannot be shaken. easily allows me to venture into what. academia is supposed to be about. Like. if you get tenure, the whole purpose of. tenure is to entertain uh ideas outside.

the box because they may bring the next. revolution, the next breakthrough. And. uh what happens instead is you see. people that uh get tenure and at that. point all they care about is getting. honors and awards and and and grants and. for that you have um to dance to the. tunes of selections selection. committees. You have to be nice to. everyone. Basically, admit that [snorts]. the the the common folklore is the. correct one because if you were to. deviate from that, you will be chased.

and brought down as soon as that. happens. And I don't care about this. I'm not I even said that if I find with. the Galileo project that I'm leading, if. I find clear evidence for uh. extraterrestrial artifacts, okay? Um and. the Nobel committee decides to to award. me the Nobel Prize, I will play the Bob. Dylan card on that one, I will simply. avoid them. I I don't care how much how. many times they call me because if I. find that we have a neighbor cosmic.

neighbor, I better dedicate the. remaining time I have on this earth to. figure out what it means, you know? Why. would I have cocktail parties in Sweden? Who cares about it? >> Let me ask you, are you aware of because. this is Harvard and astronomy, I have to. ask, are you aware of the Mensel gap? >> Yes. >> Um, so for those folks who don't know, Donald Mensel was a he became a director. of astronomy at Harvard. Right. >> He came in in 1952 and destroyed a third. of the photographic plates just after. the biggest UFO sighting in history I.

think till this day. >> and stopped watching the skies. >> with no review of the plates just. destroyed them. What how does how do you. square that? >> Well, there is a simple explanation to. that. >> please. >> Yeah. um. he probably either was asked by. government or or decided that it's there. is a lot of classified information there. because it was the same time that. satellites were launched for espionage. purposes and. >> so he didn't want that to appear. Now. the same theme you can find nowadays. because you know the Reuben Observatory.

in Chile is collecting data on the sky. and um the leader of of um the science. team at the Reubin Observatory said that. in an interview he said that um he was. approached by an agency within the. government that asked him to transfer. the data that the Reuben Observatory. collects through them first and they. just have a script that they will apply. to the data and then give it back to him. so that he can disseminate it within the. scientific community. So you ask.

yourself why do they need to put a. script on the data because there are. plenty of satellites that the US. government doesn't want the world to. know about or other gadgets up there. And I think Mensel was probably. motivated by the same thing. But he was. much more harsh basically not allowing. any data to be collected because that. was just the beginning of the space age. and they didn't have the protocols to. deal with you know uh national security. concerns in space. Um so he basically. probably just did that. That would be my.

guess. He I mean he had top secret at. the highest clearance and he did that I. think just weeks after the Robertson. panel from the CIA said we've got to get. rid of all this stuff about UFOs. >> But you realize that part of the um the. classification of information associated. with UAP is because some of those. objects that we might think as private. citizens to be extraterrestrial they. might not be. They are the highest level. technologies being used by the US and. they don't want us to know about it. So. obviously they would have a stake in. going through the data and saying no we.

don't want the public to know about. this. So that is completely. understandable. It is. >> the question is do they have data on. things that are clearly not from this. earth technologically in origin that. they just put aside at the time that. these things were discovered because the. sensors that discovered those things. were classified. So it's not the things. it's the sensors. And my argument is if. we go back 50 years let's say Roswell or.

others other events um 50 years or more. whatever technologies was were used by. humans back then are completely. irrelevant in today's technological you. know um platforms. >> but still classified a lot of it. Yes. So the point my point is it should be. declassified of course all of this old. data because it's irrelevant. The. sensors are old and they're not used. anymore. The I mean compare images from. 20 years ago to images we get today. I.

mean and obviously now they have. satellites monitoring the ground and by. the way we've never seen any photographs. from satellites even though John. Ratcliffe commented on that. Y. >> that I think is an interesting uh part. of the puzzle about the UAP. >> suspicious interesting suspicious. >> Yeah. And and that's why the exchange. between well first former President. Obama saying they're real and then. paddling back from that and then.

President Trump saying he shouldn't have. said that it's classified. >> That was very strange. Um and then. President Trump giving a directive to. the Pentagon to release whatever they. have that they can release without of. course compromising national security. But the question is will they release. will we be able to learn something new? It's not obvious to me because. maybe they don't have anything beyond. humanmade technology. Maybe that's one. possibility. However, there are people. who worked in government saying that.

some of the materials were delivered to. corporations and I had a visitor to my. home. >> So, this is this is meaning like. Lockheed, Rathon, those contractors. getting alien technology. >> potentially. >> Potentially, >> so we don't know. And I had a former. executive of Loit Martin visiting my. home and I asked him, "Is this. nonsense?" and he said, "No, it's not. necessarily wrong." And u I then asked.

another u former employee of Loit Martin. and he said, "I've never heard about. this.". >> So it's probably comp compartmentalized. And the question is who knows what and I. don't know if the president of the. United States knows everything, but. >> the fundamental question is there. something there that is not humanmade? And if there is, I think it's completely. inappropriate to withhold the. information from the public for the same. reason that if you go and visit your. backyard, backyard of your home and you. see a tennis ball and you realize I must.

have a neighbor because usually I see. only rocks here. Uh then you sit at at. the dinner table with your family member. members. Will you hide it from them or. tell them that they have a neighbor? the. the correct answer is obviously tell. them because someone may knock up on on. the front door you know one day or their. life could be shaped by the neighbor in. other ways and um it makes no sense. whatsoever to hide such information.

>> but the argument could be that it's a. national security risk that we can't. have our adversaries have that. technology I think that's valid now. >> well that assumes that we understand the. technology and they don't but I would. doubt it because both corporations and. government do not have the best minds in. physics. >> No. >> Working for them. And if they were to. open it to a broader community of. scientists, I think everyone would. benefit. I don't think it makes any. sense to hide it just for the same. reason that it didn't make sense for the. Vatican to put Galileo Galile in house.

arrest. Uh in, you know, in 1992, 350. years after he passed away, they. announced that he was right. But by. then, you know, humans landed on the. moon two decades earlier and and it was. very embarrassing for for the Vatican to. do that. And I love the Italians, by the. way. I know that you are you have a. heritage, Italian heritage. I you know I. I was actually in Pisa. I gave a series. of lectures in honor of Galo Gal. It's.

called Cathedral Galilana and my wife. loves Italy and um but the Vatican. misbehaved and u it was not a good. public relations stunt for them to do. that. >> Is that why we you've named it project. Galileo? Is history repeating itself? >> Well, there are several connections that. I have with Galileo. Uh first I gave. this set of lectures in his in cathedral. held on his name. Um and that was at. school normal superior in Pisa, one of.

the finest academic institutions in. Italy. Uh and then um the name Galileo. is also. um after the northern part of Israel. Um. obviously um this connects to the. Christian religion uh in a very deep. way. Um and um so I feel connected in. that way. But most importantly um. attending to data that you see through. telescopes or otherwise is a principle.

that you would expect all scientists. today to abide by. Okay. And Galileo. pioneered it. But what do I see around. me? The mainstream of the physics. community theoretical physics community. for 50 years by the way which is as long. as I was practicing physics half of the. history of modern physics is 50 years. Okay. During that time, the mainstream. of theoretical physics was focused on. the idea that extra dimensions will. allow us to unify quantum mechanics and.

gravity, >> right? >> And that's called string theory. >> Yes. >> And they still do that. But they haven't. made any specific comparison of their. ideas to data to experimental evidence. They don't have such an experiment in. mind that will test their theory. And. moreover, it's even worse. They don't. have a prediction that is unique and if. we uh contradict it with experiments, the theory will be dead. They don't have. such thing because they have a theory. that can basically explain anything that.

you find experimentally. Uh and so my. complaint is you know here is a. mainstream community that was for 50. years working on extra dimensions and. making a proposal for unifying quantum. kinds of gravity that will not be tested. in the lifetime of the people who. practice it. So how can they call. themselves physicists? After all the. guillotin of experiments is the way of. chopping [snorts] the head of wrong. ideas. You know we can think about an. infinite number of wrong ideas. reality.

is a realization of one of them. So you. can think of physicists as you know. they're practicing the best way to. narrow down the possibilities just like. a detective you know so you do. experiments you test ideas and many most. of them are wrong because our. imagination you know especially the. imagination of script writers in. Hollywood you know science fiction. script writers they have a huge. imagination when people ask me how would. the alien look like I say I don't know I.

mean this imagination of the script. writers in Hollywood was based on a. training data set that was limited to. this earth. You know, it's just like. LLMs, those artificial intelligence. systems, they are trained on data sets. and they reflect. those data sets. So, think about an. extraterrestrial, an alien, a real. alien. Their data set is is is far. bigger than what we find here on Earth. uh because there is much more real. estate if you look up. And so imagining.

I was actually faced with this dilemma. cuz um the most accomplished sculptor in. the US called Greg Wyatt, he gave me the. foundation of a sculpture and I decided. to make it about to call it the alien. So I had to come up with a sculpture. that will be now cast in in in bronze. actually in the coming months. So. >> you designed the alien. >> Yeah. >> What does he look like? Well, I tried to. ask the question if you look at the. human body, obviously it's not. optimized. I would if I had if I was an.

architect, I would put it differently. cuz one thing we're missing is for. example a third eye that can look. backwards, right? That must have been a. disadvantage. People can surprise you. from the back. Why don't we have another. eye? Probably it's a matter of data. processing. You know, it wasn't that bad. because you can turn your head maybe and. so that saved the lives of our. ancestors. But um so I put a third eye. in the sculpture and I put also uh wings. that would allow it to fly and uh go in.

water. And I put the three I put the. tentacles that come out of it with. electronic with connectors to electronic. gadgets. And [laughter]. I put three legs that would allow it to. move in difficult terrains. >> You took the Capernac principle and. threw it away. You threw it away. Yes. Capernican principle where everything is. sort of we expect to see the same type. of physiology everywhere but you created. new physiology. >> I just ask if I were the architect.

uh and I'm not pretending to be God. here. [laughter] If I were to design. something better. >> some of your critics say that you you do. that. >> Um. >> we'll get to that. We'll get to that. >> Okay. Um no I mean I will die in a few. decades. What do you mean? [laughter]. Um but my point is that um perhaps they. um were born as biological creatures but. they modified their bodies in ways that. would allow them survival under in. foreign territories. So if I want to.

imagine them visiting us I would uh uh. imagine their bodies being more capable. than ours. Uh unlike science fiction. movies that often have two eyes and so. forth. Um, if you go to a crash site and. you find debris. and you find pilots that look like. humans, it's probably humans. So, humans. from the future. >> Oh, that's an interesting possibility. In fact, you know, if we look at Earth, there are a number of catastrophes that.

the Earth went through. And you may ask. yourself, was any of these catastrophes. triggered by a technological. civilization? And of course, if if it. existed not long ago, we would still. find computer terminals in. archaeological digs, you know, and. >> satellites. >> We would also find satellites because. anything beyond the geocynchronous orbit. would survive, doesn't have any friction. on on the earth's atmosphere. So um for.

example the Romans the Roman Empire if. they launched a satellite up to 1,200. kilometers altitude these satellites. would just be grinding their way down. now we would see those satellites. falling down to earth now and we would. see here is a Roman satellite we haven't. seen that okay and the dinosaurs if they. launched anything to. you know a geocynchronous orbit or or.

even uh closer then it would still be. around you know and and we haven't seen. anything. So that's perhaps well but we. if there are uh unidentified anomalous. phenomena they could have been those. gadgets that were left behind from a. previous civilization that somehow you. know had the the failure modes that we. have you know we engage in conflicts uh. very often mainly male alpha males. >> Yes. Uh and we also um.

often do things that harm us in the long. term but we enjoy it in the short term. Um and one example that I recently uh. wrote about is there is a company now. that wants to get um uh approval from. the FCC to put uh mirrors in the sky. >> I've heard about this channeling solar. energy to the to the planet. Yes. >> Yes. uh during nighttime. So basically. each beam of light will.

>> a huge array of satellites, right? Thousands. >> 50,000 they ask for 50,000 satellites. and they they will produce each of them. will produce a beam of light 5 km in. diameter uh that can illuminate for. example a city. Uh the problem is that. we won't be able to observe the universe. at night. The only reason we can learn. about the universe is because the earth. blocks sunlight and that allows. astronomers to look at from the dark. side of the earth to look out and see. faint sources of light. That's the only.

reason we can do astronomy. Now this. company wants to illuminate the night. side with these flood lights and the. problem is that part of the light will. be scattered by clouds and. so we if I this this could be a new. answer to Ferm's paradox you know Enrico. Fermy in 1950 asked where is everybody. >> right. >> uh he was an Italian. >> and if I was next to him I I I would put.

my hand around him and say and Rico this. is a question that every lonely person. asks and what you tell a lonely person. is don't be so presumptuous. You're not. that attractive. They will not come to. Los Alamos, have lunch with you, you. have to pursue them. Uh because you know. space and time in astronomical terms are. huge and the chance of them just joining. Enrico at lunchtime in Los Alamos in. 1950 is tiny. So you have to engage in. building telescopes, searching around.

That's what I'm doing with the Galileo. project. and and Rico didn't build a. telescope. Uh but at any event, uh one. answer to his question, where is. everybody is maybe they had companies. like this one uh that would illuminate. the. night side of of their planet so that uh. astronomers or observers cannot look at. the rest of the universe. And then a. giant. rock similar to the one that killed the. dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Y.

>> would eventually hit them and they end. their life on a time scale much shorter. uh than they hope for. >> I hadn't considered that that that new. project will make it much harder to. track near Earth objects. >> Already now there are 10,000. communication satellites by SpaceX and. others. >> Yep. >> Um that um are reflecting sunlight. because they're they're not hidden. behind the shadow of the Earth. So if if. >> the astronomers [snorts] hate these. >> Yeah. Yeah. So they create streaks in. the Reubin data and we you you can look.

at those data because now it's available. publicly and you can see those streaks. So the astronomers have to remove them. But if you put a mirror basically you'll. get as much sunlight as during the day. if if the mirror is pointed at you um. over the the region that you're in and. uh and so that will be a catastrophe for. observing the night sky. >> This goes out for public comment soon. Yes. Where we can. >> right now. Okay. And uh actually I'm not. sure if this uh podcast will be.

broadcasted before the FCC. >> next week. >> hearing about about a week. >> Yeah. So um so this is an example for a. step that is not wise. Okay. To prevent. us from observing the rest of the. universe by blinding us with sunlight. even on the night side. But there are. many other things you know where people. eat things that harms their body. we. produce artificial intelligence systems. that make us more stupid. Uh by the way, you know, I I do see this tendency among.

students that they. addicted to AI agents in ways that. compromise their cognitive abilities and. uh it's much worse than social media. used to you know the harms of social. media are well recognized now and. they're they're being banned for young. kids but but AI could be much worse. because it will affect adults deterior. Just like you decide to take public. transportation instead of walking. because the technology is out there. It's not good for you. You have to walk. You have to do some exercise. Um.

>> take the stairs. >> take and the same is true for your. cognitive abilities, the abilities of. your brain. Um, so I'm worried about the impact of. AI, not in the way that many other. people worry about of it, you know, creating um, harmful consequences as a. result of it giving instructions. uh, in the wrong directions. I'm worried. about it controlling the human mind and. basically providing it with junk food. And it's just it's junk intellectual.

food that we could be provided similar. to junk food. Eating junk food that. harms your body. Uh. >> I I I think I could be wrong, but I. think it could help in some ways where. it could separate real thinkers from. those who are a little bit lazy. No, >> as long as they exist. >> As long as they exist. So what what we. need to educate our kids for and by the. way I'm sure that most of the uh. entrepreneurs that promote artificial. intelligence and make their money out of. it they don't allow their kids to use it.

as much. I would be surprised if they. allow their because there would be. negative negative implications to the. brain of their kids. Uh and at the. moment there are no uh uh there is no. legislation or uh by by policy makers to. cope with that. I this is the one thing. I really lose sleep at night. The impact. of AI and by the way it's accelerating. very quickly. >> Yes. >> Um I can tell you that in science uh a. few weeks ago.

uh a number of scientists told me that. AI is changing the way they do science. One of them even said that it can the AI. agents can do 90% of what these. scientists used to do. 90%. And this is. one of the most accomplished scientists. that I know about. >> What what is AI doing for the. scientists? >> So I I'll give you an example. Um 6. years ago um I asked an undergraduate. student at Harvard, go look at a catalog.

of meteors. That was this this is. meteors are objects colliding with earth. and burning up producing a fireball as a. result of friction with air. >> Yep. uh similar to an atomic explosion. And actually every year you have a me a. meteor that releases as much energy as. the Hiroshima atomic bomb energy every. year. It's never reported in the news. because the explosion takes place at an. altitude of 30 to 50 km. So it's pretty.

high. Doesn't cause much damage on the. ground. The Hiroshima atomic bomb was. released from 600 m above Hiroshima. And. that's in order to maximize the damage. But these meteors are not. So we don't. hear. >> like a Tangusa meteor for example. >> No, much smaller than that. Much smaller. every year. >> Tonguska is a century ago. So of course. you have bigger things causing more. damage. And you know the dinosaurs were. went extinct by a a rock the size of.

Manhattan Island. But those. >> come to Earth once every 50 to 100. million years. Okay. So there is plenty. of time. We we might get one if we if we. illuminate the night sky, we won't even. know about it. Um u but the point is. that um there are uh rocks the size of a. person basically one to two meters in. size or a few meters in size that. release as much energy as the Hiroshima. atomic bomb every year. And um uh only.

one in a thousand of those may may have. originated from outside the solar. system. These are the interesting ones. cuz then you can check if any of them. might be a Voyager-l like meteor. You. know that my you know uh meteor experts. would say it looks like a rock that. we've never seen before. And I would say. that's what that's what the cave dweller. would say when you present a cell phone. to a cave dweller. You know the cave. dweller is used to rocks. >> and that would be the response. It's a.

rock of a type I've never seen before. My only qu uh uh recommendation to my. colleagues, those that are comet experts. and those that are uh meteor experts is. not to restrict their statements on a. limited data set. They are used to. dealing with rocks in the sky. Okay? So. that's what they were trained on. That's. how they got their reputation. But I. tell them look there are other things in. the sky technological gadgets that we. launched that you know since the 60s the.

sky you know that we know that the space. between earth and the sun is full of. objects that were launched by the Soviet. Union by the US and so forth and so we. know that such objects exist. >> This is not in their training data. >> It's not in but there is a simple. remedy. we should train them on space. objects so that they will be more. imaginative. Instead, what they do is. attack me when I'm suggesting something. is anomalous. So, we should consider a.

technological object. Uh and and and the. amazing thing is, you know, Mua Mua, you. mentioned it. Uh in 2017, uh it was discovered by a telescope in. Hawaii and had given the name Mua, which. means a scout. Um, and then it was clear. from the beginning that it's a very. unusual a rock that we've never seen. before. Why? Because the amount of. sunlight reflected from it. >> I want I want to hold this I want to. hold this after the break. Um, cuz this.

is what everyone wants to hear. And to. before we get to Amumu Mua, go back to. aliens for just a second. Do you think. that the gray aliens that people talk. about, are they really are they really. seeing aliens? >> Well, I I don't know until I see the. evidence. You see the the problem with. stories is that you don't know whether. to believe those stories and we all know. about people that were put on death row. uh because there were eyewitness. testimonies um asserting conclusively. that they are guilty of the crime that.

they committed and then DNA evidence. came along and proved them innocent. How. do you explain that? Well, because. humans often reach the wrong. conclusions. They have wishful thinking. So I can imagine a situation where there. is a unit within government for. retrieval and reverse engineering. of debris from crash sites. Why can I. imagine that to be actually the case is. because that was a technique used by all. nations to spy on their adversaries. Of.

course, >> if you find a a fighter jet that was. produced by the Soviet Union, you know, you would like to look at all the. electronics there and figure out the. weak points. And the same is true now of. drones, for example. So definitely you. want to collect materials from crash. sites and in the process of doing so. every now and then you confront. technologies that are unusual. Now I can. imagine a situation where this office. within the US government that definitely.

exists. It's it exists in any. government. Um this office wanted to. hide what the US government knows about. technologies produced by adversaries. The way to hide it is to say oh no we. found some alien. trash you know it's it's alien. >> Yeah. And of course in that case the. pilots that you would find you know. depending on whether they came from. China, Russia or which ethnicity they. are they would look different. So you. would have different types of pilots. Uh.

and the question is whether this. mythology of. um uh you know retrieval retrieved. materials um came from basically an. attempt by the intelligence agencies to. hide what the US knows about adversarial. nations or whether there are real aliens. there and if there are I would love to. see it. >> Me too. And um by the way, I you know, if they sign me on some non-disclosure. agreement, I would accept it because I.

want to know the answer. The way that. you would know that I know the answer is. by me not speaking about it. >> Yeah. You disappear from the podcast. circuit. That's for sure. That's how we. >> or avoiding the question. >> or avoiding which the moment. >> which you're kind of doing now kind a. little bit. A little bit. >> No, I say I don't have any evidence one. way or another. So, >> but when you went to Arrow, what was. that like? Yeah. So they invited me and. um uh straight from the beginning I. asked them and by the way their new um.

director is is very reasonable. I mean. >> and um. >> I said okay um you've been looking at. those reports hundreds of them. Uh first. do you have are you sure that you have. access to all the information? They said. absolutely sure we have direct access to. all the information that the government. has. That was their answer. Then I said. okay given that did you see anything. unusual. and they said no we didn't see we we. thought that 97% of the reports are.

explainable as mundane things and the. rest you know the data is not good. enough to to say anything and it's just. you know the images are too fuzzy we. can't really make any statement about it. except for a few reports from the FBI. that they got from people that they. trust trust but without uh data from. instruments. They witnessed something. These are FBI agents that are quite. reliable. Uh I don't know what the FBI.

agents saw, but um that's what I was. told. Okay. Then a day later, I sit at. the US Congress. and next to me uh is Davis. >> Eric Davis. >> Eric Davis. Yeah. So I gave my. presentation about the scientific way of. studying unidentified anomalous. phenomena with the Galilo project. We. are now we can talk more about it later. >> And then uh they asked him to provide.

his presentation and he he spoke about. the four types of aliens that are the. pilots within the the material retrieved. from crash sites. And I asked after that. I asked my wife who should I believe you. know obviously they cannot be entirely. correct both both arrow and Eric Davis. >> right. >> someone doesn't know the full truth. and uh who who should I believe and I I.

I basically don't know uh so I'm I'm. waiting for. >> you won't don't want to speculate you. don't have an instinct a gut feeling. >> my gut feeling is that we are definitely. not alone Okay, that um because we know. of a 100 billion suns in the Milky Way. galaxy alone, we know that about 10% of. them have a planet the size of the earth. roughly at the same separation. So of. all the 10 billion earth sun analoges. and when you look at your street and you. see 10 billion houses just like yours.

and you say well those are probably full. of microbes and that's what my. colleagues are saying microbes we should. invest more than $10 billion in. searching for microbes and I say yeah. that's great yes it's very likely that. we will find evidence for microbes but. it's difficult to detect them remotely. when you're sitting at your home and. looking out at the cosmic street, you. know, when you have to devel you have to. invest in a a habitable world. observatory, state-of-the-art.

observatory that will cost more than $10. billion. And the end of the day, the. best you can do is detect some gases. that are released by those by those. microbes in the atmosphere of the. planets like for example oxygen, methan, bio signatures. And the point is the. some of these molecules are also. produced by geological process. So, at. the end of the day, after putting the. $10 billion, you might not even know for. sure if you have microbes. And I say, well, let's hedge our bets, okay? Because if we discover a spacecraft near. Earth, then it will be conclusive. Uh we.

if we have a high resolution image, we. can see the buttons on it or we can see. it's technological, not a rock. This. will not be disputed. It's sort of like. centuries after Galileo told the the. church what he told them. There is so. much data that they cannot deny it. Uh. so if we have that data quickly then. that that would be clear. >> This is like Pascal's wager. No that the. the even though the chances are very. small it's still worth the effort. >> Definitely because for two reasons. One.

if you don't search you will not find. anything. It's a self-fulfilling. prophecy of all these dogmatists because. they don't want they base their stature. on claiming that things like that are. difficult to find. So they don't want. their evidence to come out because it. will sabotage their claim throughout the. years of marginalizing this research. Uh. but also obviously. uh in addition that we we will continue. I mean it serves the ego of many people. to say you know that Elon Musk is the.

most accomplished space entrepreneur. since the big bang. Okay. Uh, and I say, "Let's check. [laughter] Let's look.". And Elon himself is doubtful. Yeah. I. don't think, you know, I don't know. I I. I'm willing to put a bet with him that. if we invest the money, similarly to the. search for microbes, we might find it. Uh because without putting the billions. of dollars towards the search, how do. you expect to find something easily? I. mean, so so I'm saying let's hedge our.

bets. This is the most sensible thing to. do because under sim to argue that under. similar circumstances you get similar. outcomes and you know we are not the. pinnacle of creation. Just read the news. every day. There are so many uh things. that I would love to change in the way. that humans operate. >> Sure. >> Um so saying that we are the top of the. food chain is really arrogant. And I say. let's not be arrogant because that will. maintain our ignorance. And I say you.

okay you're willing to put $10 billion. as by the way this is the flagship. mission that was the highest priority. within the mainstream astronomy. community 10 billion fine but let's put. some a few billions also to the search. for technological signatures because. they are conclusive if we find them. right. >> and I you know just saying that there. are residents in some of these houses is. not speculative it's not heresy it's. common sense and the amazing thing is. the public gets it.

>> and the public is extremely excited. about it. >> So when I talk about it, I get attention. and that infuriates my colleagues. because how dare you give him a platform. to speak about this. >> Too bad we're going to keep talking. about it. Obby, given what we know about. exoplanets, do we have an update to. Drake's equation? How many how many. could be out there? >> Uh well, there are at least a few per. star. Okay. >> Right. Um and uh we know that from.

various techniques that we are using. For example, when a planet passes in. front of the face of the star, we see uh. demunition. decrease in. >> my audience knows knows transiting. They. they know. >> exactly the transit method. We also see. uh I mean some planets are detected by. the fact that they uh gravitationally. attract the the star to move back and. forth as they move around it. So these. are mainly Jupiters and there is also. the possibility of direct imaging and. there is the method that I proposed when.

I was a postoc at Princeton that since. then became a whole field of research. and that's using gravitational lensing. So basically you have a star that is uh. lensing by gravity the light coming from. a star behind it far away uh and uh that. could magnify the background star for a. short period of time when it passes. behind the lens. So just the force of. gravity and Einstein predicted it back. in 1940. He didn't expect it to be. discovered but but we now know of lots.

of micro we call it micro because it's a. star doing the lensing. There are also. lensing effects of galaxies and that. they're much bigger. But um the point is that if the light. from the background star is passing near. a planet then the planet can do. additional lensing on top of what the. star that the lens star is doing. Right? >> And I realized so the story is very very. funny. I um my next door neighbor when I. was at Princeton the Institute for. Advanced Stud I knew nothing about. astronomy when I came in. I realized.

he's writing papers about gravitational. microl lensing by stars. And I went to. his office. His name is Andy Gould. And. I said, Andy, um, what if there is a. planet next to the star? Wouldn't that. introduce a nice bump on the light curve. of the background star? And he said, "No, it won't work because planets are. much less massive than the star." Which. is true that the Earth is, you know, sure tiny. >> But there still must be some wobble. No, some. >> Yeah, but it will be undetectable. He. said. >> then within 10 minutes he comes to my.

office and says a you are right actually. the effect goes like the square root of. the mass ratio not like the mass ratio. >> really. >> Yeah. So it's much bigger. It could be a. few percent. >> I would thought think it would be the. inverse like like inverse square law. No. it's. >> no no no. So the planet is located like. the earth for example is uh at a certain. distance from the sun. If you put that. configuration. uh halfway through the Milky Way galaxy,

it's the ideal position for the planet. to affect the light that is being lensed. by the star. That's the coincidence, right? >> And then when the light passes near the. planet of one of the lensed images, it. gets lensed by the planet. But the. question is, is the effect smaller by. the mass ratio of the planet relative to. the star? It turns out by the square. root of the mass. So it's much more. significant cuz the mass ratio is tiny. And so he said let's write a paper about. it. We wrote and it became a whole field.

of finding planets this way. Uh you can. even find planets. that are rogue planets that are just. without a star this way with. gravitational lensing. And um have we. found rogue planets? >> Yes. >> Those scare me. >> Um in fact the the solar system lost. probably as much as it has right now uh. comparable amount of planets. There must. have been planets like the earth that. were kicked out of the solar system. because of uh Jupiter for example. passing near them. uh and the only.

planets that remained are those in. stable orbits and that that's where the. earth is relative to Jupiter and Mars is. but initially there were many more. planets and many of which were expelled. and um even the earth suffered an impact. by a Mars size body and that produced. the moon by the way. >> this is the thea impact. >> Yes. Yeah. So basically chipped, you. know, I fell on the ground a few months. ago and I chipped the tip of my nose,

but the Earth lost a significant amount. of mass. >> So the moon is in a spaceship brought. here by by lizard aliens. >> Oh, okay. >> By the way, the moon will come back to. Earth. Did you know that? >> No, I thought it was leaving Earth. >> It is. >> Yeah, but it's going to come back. >> Yes. >> When is that supposed to happen? >> So the moon naturally is moving away. from Earth. And right now it has the. same angular size as the sun. That's why. we have an eclipse. Complete coincidence. you might ask. Well, in the past it was. bigger than the sun in angle and in the.

future it will be smaller than the sun. but right now it can do an eclipse and a. full eclipse which is amazing. And. that's we don't know why but um the. thing is that the sun will die. By the. way, I said that to a receptionist uh in. an office. I said everything she was. complaining about things changing and I. the system that she's using is changing. I said everything is changing. The sun. will die one day. >> Why did [laughter] you tell her that? She's just having problems with her. Excel sheet. You're going to tell her. the sun's dying. Poor dear.

>> Yeah. So she said I Wow, I can't believe. it. She said. >> but she didn't know that. >> No, she she said it's against my. religion. >> Oh. >> So I said look I'm sorry to be the. bearer of bad news [laughter]. but it's very simple. We know that the. sun will die for a simple fact that. there are lots of dead suns already in. the Milky Way galaxy. These are stars. that like the sun that formed before the. sun. The sun formed just in the last. onethird of cosmic history. It's 4.6. billion years old. The age of the.

universe is 13.8. 4.6 is exactly 1/3 of. 13.8. So most of the stars in the Milky. Way galaxy were formed billions of years. before the sun. By the way, that's. another argument that we may be late to. the party. there might be others. visiting us because. the the Voyager spacecraft will take. less than a billion years to cross the. entire Milky Way galaxy. So, so the fact. that other stars are older than the sun. is a good argument for why we should. expect something to be even with the.

1970s technologies of Voyager, it could. make uh the the journey between other. stars and us over the time difference. between the formation of the sun and the. formation of of their star. And all. those dead stars could have had. civilizations. >> Yeah. And um by the way, the sun will. die and become a a white what is called. a white dwarf. 60% of the mass of the. sun packed within a region the size of. Earth. >> Just imagine that. It's like a a. metallic ball, very dense.

>> Um and the so that will be the end of. the sun, but we know we see other stars. that ended up already as white dwarfs. We see, you know, the the Milky Way. galaxy is full of billions of white. dwarfs. So, it's just like going to the. graveyard. And you notice in the. graveyard are people who are dead. What. does it tell you? Tells you that you. will die, >> right? [laughter]. >> So, it's very simple. So, we have a. young star, relatively young, you know, last one-third of cosmic history. It has.

another billion years before it will. basically create um uh too much heat on. Earth. and um the earth would lose all. of the liquid water on its surface. So. we have just 1 billion years left before. just the evolution of the sun will not. enable life as we know it. Um but within. 7.6 billion years. the sun will die and the envelope of the.

sun will expand and engulf the earth. It. will also engulf the moon but the moon. moves around the earth. So the friction. on the sun's envelope would be bring the. moon crashing down on Earth. >> Oh wow. This would make a great movie. >> I don't know how many people know about. it. >> I never heard that theory before that. >> I I I get approached a lot by people in. Hollywood um who are making all kinds of. movies. >> Um. >> don't you have a Netflix documentary. coming out?

>> Yes. >> When? >> But that's like a reality TV kind of. thing. Okay. They went with me to the. expedition and uh they even went with me. to Vegas here when we uh put an. observatory on top of sphere and um. >> what's up there? What's on top of the. sphere? What does that even look like? >> Just watch the uh promo video for Mari. Supreme because. >> you won't tell me. I have to go watch. the promo [laughter].

>> because Timothy Shalamé went on top of. the sphere. They turned the light such. that it looks like a ping-pong. >> I didn't know he had a background in. astrophysics, but that's interesting. [laughter]. >> And um so that was the promo and if you. look at the images that they took, you. can see the observatory. I visited uh. the top of the sphere. Um and that's a. 100 meter kind of construction um to put. the observatory there because we monitor. the sky. >> There's no light pollution problem here. >> Not at night. We use infrared sensors.

and we tested for that. But this is one. unit and we have additional units. looking at the same objects at the same. time that allows us to triangulate. >> Yeah. I don't Are any other. observatories triangulating? I don't I. don't think so. >> No. So um that's an amazing uh. accomplishment we have from the last few. weeks. And uh now for the first time. we're able to tell distances and. velocities and accelerations of object. Because if you don't know the distance,

it can be a relatively slow object. moving just in front of you. Um, and. this allows us to check if all the. objects we find in the sky are within. the performance envelope of humanmade. technology. So we are now at a point. where we don't need to wait for the US. government to tell us what lies outside. the solar system. We can find out. I. mean, it may be just like waiting for. God, you know, the Samuel Becket play. You can wait forever. or the government. will trick you and but you can instead. just look up you know what's the big.

deal and do it in a scientific way. >> Is this why you opened it up to the. public? No. >> Yeah. So we uh encourage volunteers to. go through some of the images that. because this will be the ground truth. that we can train machine learning. software to figure out um if you know. because machine learning or artificial. intelligence can go over much larger. volumes of data that we get every day. We we're monitoring millions of objects. per year. And so once we train the AI, it would do a lot of work. But in order.

to train it, we need to know what the. ground truth is. And for that, we ask. volunteers to look at the images and. identify different types of objects. >> Have you found anything interesting yet? >> Well, I told my research team uh that if. they see any anomalous object, uh they. can call me at the middle of the night. Um and um so far they haven't. >> Any plans for additional observatories? >> Yeah. So we have one in Massachusetts,

another one in Pennsylvania. in addition to the one in Las Vegas. And. we are basically limited by uh donations. by the funding that we get. Uh we just. over the past week received a very. generous donation from the Templeton. Foundation which uh. >> so the public can support this. financially if if we want to. Okay. >> Yeah. And we have a foundation that is a. 501c that doesn't um um we don't have to. pay uh taxes for for the donations or uh.

we don't need to pay overhead uh through. Harvard University. So um you know in. principle the donations go to our. observatories to build new ones or to. put better instruments but there are. other ambitions to the Galo project. For. example going after interstellar. meteors. These are objects colliding. with earth that came from outside the. solar system. And just a few weeks ago, we discovered a new one. Uh, and that is.

the what I I mentioned before that the. the interstellar meteor from 2014 that. we went after in the expedition to the. Pacific Ocean that I asked my student. six years ago to look through the NASA. catalog and find any object that is. moving too fast to be bound to the sun. uh so that it's interstellar in origin. And it took him a week to come back and. say, "I found this one. It looks really. interesting.". >> That's the main indicator is the speed. >> Yes. Because if something moves faster.

than the escape speed, it couldn't have. been bound to the solar system unless. there was another object colliding with. it that kicked it. But but Mua, for. example, came from a completely. different direction than uh the solar. system planets, the quota, the plane, the ecliptic. Y. >> um and so you can easily tell if you go. back in time whether the object passed. near another one or not. Uh and in all. these cases the the objects were moving. very fast outside the solar system. So.

they're moving at 60 km/s or so. And. that's like 600 times faster than our. fastest racing car. And by the way, I. know that because a car racer in. California um uh decided to put at the. NASCAR car race decided to put my image. along with the image of interstellar. objects. >> Your face on a race car. >> Yes. >> And I told him, look, it's a compliment. for me, >> of course,

>> but not a compliment for 3i Atlas, for. example, because that one is moving at. 600 times faster than your your race. car. You know, you can't. So anyway, um. the point is that I gave the same task. to an AI agent just a few weeks ago and. within 10 minutes we had a new. interstellar meteor that it identified. in the same data set of NASA. >> So this is the different than the one in. the Pacific. >> So we have a new one that is 600 km from.

Peru. >> Let's take a quick break and we'll come. back with interstellar objects. Be right. back. So 2017, Pan Stars finds uh three eye mu mua, >> one eye, >> one eye, one eye, omua, because the. first one and. you're you're still the chair of. astronomy at Harvard. You see the data, you see the data and suddenly you want. to write a paper about it. What did you. see in the data? >> Well, it's not me. I mean, the first. report about.

MUA was that it's very strange. Uh in. fact um the observers argue that it must. be. flat or cigar- shaped and the brightness. is proportional to the surface area of. these objects in the sky. So if it. changed by a factor of 10, it means the. object must have an extreme shape. Imagine a piece of paper tumbling in the. wind even though it's razor thin. Uh the. likelihood of it being edge on is small.

So. changes by a factor of 10 in the surface. area means the object is unusual. >> Right? >> And in fact the best fit to the. variation of light was that of a flat. object not cigar shape that is 10 times. longer. uh projected on the sky than it is white. projected on the sky. And I simply. suggested maybe the object is very thin. Um because the one other fact about it. was that it was pushed away from the sun.

by some mysterious force without showing. any evidence for gas or dust being. evaporated from it. So when it was first. discovered I said that's strange. Um. let's check if there is any radio signal. coming from it. So I suggested it to. radio observers and they checked that it. doesn't transmit any radio signals at. the level even of a cell phone. Um but. then came the second piece of evidence. that it's being pushed away from the sun.

without the rocket effect acting on it. from vapor gas. >> Yeah. The the jetting that made news. That made news. >> So I said what could push it? And in. fact the the force was declining. inversely with distance squared from the. sun. So that is exactly what you expect. from a thin object pushed by sunlight. And I said well maybe it is a thin. object pushed by sunlight that is. manufactured technologically. And as. soon as I said that well first of all. the reviewer of the paper that I wrote.

with uh one of my postocs the reviewer. said um this is an excellent idea. because we know the object is flat and. um uh it shows this uh unusual. acceleration. So maybe that's true. So. the paper was accepted for publication. within 3 days. >> Three days peer reviewed. >> peer reviewed and published. >> astronomical astronomical. >> the astrophysical journal journal. >> Yeah. And um then uh. the the media got a hold of the story.

and um within a day I had a television. crew at the front door um and I said, "Sorry, I have to go to the airport. I'm. I'm attending a conference in Germany.". And they said, "Oh, we just have one. question. Are we alone?". >> Oh, boy. So I went to Germany and the. there was a whole conference falling. walls which is quite prestigious after. the falling of the Berlin walls and um. it was in Berlin and as soon as I.

arrived everyone around so we had dinner. and all the other speakers said oh you. are a love that everyone is speaking. about and then there was. a group of several dozens of reporters. that wanted to speak with me at the same. time. So they the organizers put them in. one room and I entered uh to that. conference room and an Italian reporter. shouted from the back do you think that. you are Galileo? [laughter]. And I said I don't think anything. I'm.

just talking about this object which is. unusual and that's [snorts] all we need. to pay attention to. >> You didn't know that there was going to. be this firestorm? >> No, I didn't. But uh soon enough I. realized that uh it actually creates my. life. in a very turbulent uh way because uh my. colleagues in academia got very upset. The strongest force in academia is. jealousy. That's a that's well known.

And when they saw all the attention. directed towards what I'm talking about, they immediately started to say negative. things about the proposal and then. shifted towards negative things about. me. And those those are people who are. either mediocre scientists that have. never met or popularizers of science. that they did not publish a single. scientific paper in their career that. are frustrated with the fact that they. never had an academic position. And so. they attack me, a practitioner of. science that writes paper when they.

don't write any scientific paper as if. they are protecting science from me. >> How many papers had you published up. until 2017? 800 900. >> something like that. Yeah. >> So they discount all of that work. That's why I started today with the farm. and talpia and all of that because your. background usually when you do these we. jump right into aliens but I wanted. people to understand that you're an. exceptional person with an impe. impeccable record that you're now under. fire from the from the same journals. that published your papers in three days. now don't they don't want to hear from.

you. >> well no if I were to publish papers and. I do uh on conventional themes on on. things that everyone is doing along the. same lines that everyone is addressing. those topics that my papers are still. acceptable for publication very easily. But as soon as I deviate from the. expected transcript a little bit, let me. give you an example. I wrote as soon as. 3II Atlas was discovered, I wrote a. paper and I said um well um back then it.

was thought that it's 20 km in diameter. based on the reflected sunlight. And I. said if it's that big then um we have a. problem because there isn't enough. material in interstellar space to. deliver one object like it uh per five. years of the survey of that mass. There. is just not enough material. >> Right? We shouldn't have seen something. so big so soon. Right? And I said one. possible explanation is either the. object is much smaller or.

that in fact it had a purpose for. visiting the inner solar system. >> Oh, they don't like that. >> And that was in the concluding sentence. just one sentence. So the editor said I. will accept this paper for publication. as long as you remove that sentence. So I removed that sentence otherwise the. paper will not be published. But I have. a preprint version of the paper that was. still on the archive. So I wrote.

accepted for publication. And then the editor wrote to me and. said, "You are not allowed to write. accepted for publication on the version. that you put in the archive that has. this last sentence.". >> Of course, >> it's one sentence out of a paper. >> And I said, "Well, but it's the same. paper." No, it's if you remove that. sentence, you can say accepted for. publication. I didn't remove that sentence. You. didn't remove it. So I have the preprint. version with that census at the end.

>> and I have the published version without. that sentence. >> Now you ask yourself in the long scheme. of history does it really matter if I. said either the object is very small or. it had a purpose visiting the inner. solar system like why is that regarded. as heresy? Why is that forbidden from. conver the conversation? Obviously it's. something we should contemplate. Turns. out the object is 10 times smaller than. was originally conceived. So that. removes this issue. And I was right. I.

said either it's much smaller than we. think or it's. >> right. So this is just an illustration. of the level of scrutiny that you go in. just adding a sentence that allows for a. possibility. Now if I were to talk about. extra dimensions, no problem whatsoever. Do we know that there are explanations? It's just a societal. uh. acceptance among the physicists working.

on it. They say to each other, "This is. a sandbox that we want to play in. Just. like kids, even if it has nothing to do. with the reality out there, we just play. in the sandbox." And the purpose is to. demonstrate that we are smart, that we. can uh do mathematical gymnastics and. impress each other so we can give each. other awards. These string theories are. celebrating in this sandbox. The sandbox. is not forbidden in the same way that. the sandbox of allowing interstellar. objects to be technological should not.

be forbidden. But it is forbidden. Why? The public. >> The public. >> The public. And you would think the. public funds science. Therefore, as. scientists, we have the obligation to. attend to the public's interests. Right? If there is a question that is of great. interest to the public, we should attend. to it. And why should we invest10. billion dollars in the search for. microbes while allocating zero funding. federally to the search for. technological signatures? That makes no. sense given that it's coming from.

taxpayers funds. >> Cuz you mentioned string theory and if. we talk about dark matter, dark energy, >> we don't know what it is. We invested. billions billions of. >> people think that we know what that is. and that it exists. >> We call it dark matter just because we. don't know what it is. It's dark. We. can't see it. We give it a name. Um and. this there were billions of dollars. invested in searching for dark matter. For example, the uh CERN's large hydron. collider at the cost of $10 billion was. aiming to discover uh a new symmetry of.

nature called super symmetry. And if. that were the case, there would be. particles associated with this symmetry. that could be the dark matter. But. didn't find that symmetry. >> Didn't find dark matter. We still don't. know what it is. We invested billions of. dollars over decades and unless we. invest billions of dollars for the next. few decades in searching for. technological signatures, we cannot even be on the same. on on par with the other unknowns about.

the universe. And by the way, what I say. is often science funds the search for. the known unknowns. Like we know that. there should be dark matter, we just. don't know what it is. This is a known. unknown. However, the most fascinating. breakthroughs will come from the unknown. unknowns. These are things that even. Hollywood script writers cannot imagine. We even we don't know that we don't know. these things. How would we find them if. we don't open up the conversation and.

attend to anomalies, fund risky. propositions? Even though I think that. having another resident in our cosmic. street which has billions of earth sun. analogs, you know, is not a very risky. proposition. It's common sense to do. that. But even if you call it risky, let's put some of our resources in that. direction cuz every company knows that. the next breakthrough, the biggest re. revenue will come from identifying an.

opportunity that nobody else identified. It's not part of the traditional. thinking. It's something completely new. and they invest in brainstorming. sessions. However, in academia where. people are getting tenured to think. broadly, everyone is going along the. beaten path. And you ask yourself why is. that? It makes no sense. The the tenure. system was invented to encourage people. to think differently. And um even. Richard Feman said that um thinking. outside the box is is something that.

should be encouraged you know because he. was thinking differently than others. Any innovator any creator recognizes the. only recognizes that we should allow uh. people to go in uncharted territories. The only people that reject that are. mediocre people that do not have the. imagination, the foresight or the vision. and unfortunately they have the power. Uh they could be editors of journals and. then they would say well but there is no.

refereed paper on that subject. Obviously if you blocked it if you. blocked my sentence how would it will it. be and you didn't block it because you. had a good reason to block it is because. you don't think it's likely. But who are. you to say what the dark matter is? You. are not telling the people who write. about dark matter that it must be an. axion and not and by the way the SETI. community is also part of the blame. because they are not they they had a. committee that decided not to feature.

any discussions about unidentified. anomalous phenomena or technological. artifacts near Earth in their. conferences. That's an official decision. and I say to myself, >> why would they discount that? again because. >> they're still focused just on radio. >> Yes, >> that's it. >> Well, uh, >> do you think we're going to find. anything with radio telescopes? >> Well, Einstein said that if you keep. doing the same thing hoping for a. different result, you're not that smart. Right. Right. >> The point is that it's a different. method. Um, waiting for a phone call.

Nobody on your street might call you. Okay. However, you might find a package. in your mailbox or a tennis ball thrown. by a neighbor in your backyard. And. that's a completely different approach. because that tennis ball or that package. will stay there. Um all of these. interstellar objects that we studied so. far are bound by gravity to the Milky. Way. They don't leave the Milky Way. They keep accumulating over time. You. think of it of space trash or if they're. functional, they might actually visit. the inner parts. That was my point that.

3II Atlas could have decided to visit. the inner solar system because it it was. moving within five degrees of the. planet's uh orbital plane around the. sun. >> Let me ask you about that. Why is that. so strange to come in with the plane of. the ecliptic? >> Oh, because the chance for that. happening at random is one in 500. And. this is the third interstellar object. that we found. Only the third one. So. you would expect to find hundreds of. objects coming at arbitrary angles just. like Omua did, just like uh Borisov the.

second one. Y. >> um however this one was the third one. and it came right in the plane uh with a. probability of less than a percent. So. then the question is why and one. possible reason is to spend a lot of. time close to planets and get some. information about the solar system. So. this also is an opportunity for us cuz. we have a lot of space assets that can. be used to monitor 3i Atlas and I. pointed this out and representative Anna. Paulina Luna also recommended to NASA to.

use the Juno spacecraft to look at at. 3II Atlas. So I find it really. paradoxical that people in Washington DC. as well as the general public gets it. while. my colleagues do not get it. And you. know there was a request for a freedom. of information act um release about. whether there are any records within the. CIA about 3i Atlas and the response was. we cannot confirm nor deny.

>> and um they could have said we don't. have any you know. >> but even if it's not alien technology. isn't it worth the investment just to be. able to spot these objects. >> Yeah. >> because if period atlas hit us that's. the end of everything. Yes, that's. right. But you want for example to come. close to such an object to image it. You. want to land on such an object to. collect materials bringing it back to. Earth would allow us to examine whether. the building blocks of life near other. stars are the same.

>> as in on Earth. for us to make a trip to another star, you know, would take at the very least. 50,000 years to the nearest star or. billions of years to the father stars in. the Milky Way. And that's a very long. journey. We we don't we are not that. patient, right? [snorts] So these. objects already made it to our backyard. It's a loss of opportunity for us not to. invest more in studying them, bringing. materials from them cuz you know. observing the universe through. telescopes is like observing your street.

from the windows of your home. It's very. different than going there and and. collecting materials which will take a. long time. But if the material comes to. you, if you have, you know, objects. arriving at your backyard from the. cosmic street, you want to study them. You want to put billions of dollars on. that instead of because any mission that. would leave the solar system would would. consume much more money. And you take a. now on top of that there is a chance. that one of these is technological or it.

could be a Trojan horse. You think it's. a comet. From the outside, it looks like. a very mundane object, but another. civilization decided to take a hike on a. passing car and build some. infrastructure inside of it that is. technological. So, if we see any. anomalies, we might want to understand. what's going on here. Um, by the way, if. we wanted to go on a trip to. interstellar space, you know, we had the. five spacecraft that are leaving the. solar system. uh Voyager 1, Voyager 2,

Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, New Horizons. >> These are the five over the the past. half century. But we could also take a. capsule full of technological gadgets. and collide with an interstellar object. like three Atlas, bury the capsule. inside. You can put, for example, microbes in the the capsule and when the. object arrives at another star, it will. spray out uh these microbes and you will.

seed life as we know it on other. planets. >> Does that sound like a good idea? >> Well, if if it depends. It depends what. you know there are people who love as. many kids as possible. [laughter]. Uh, >> so you don't believe in like the dark. forest theory that maybe we should just. be quiet? >> It's also a possibility. We just don't. know. It's possible that the solution to. Ferm's paradox is that there are aliens. not far from us, but they're quiet, silent because they live in a dark.

forest where there could be predators. and those that were not careful were. killed. >> And so they're listening to us and we. might hear from them and they're not. very far away. You can imagine uh. technological craft being parked in the. solar system. Uh any object bigger than. a football field will not be visible at. distances larger than 10 times the earth. sun separation for the telescopes we are. operating now. So there could be plenty. of technological objects far away bigger.

than the biggest rocket we ever built. bigger than starship a football field. size beyond 10 times the air sun. separation. It wouldn't reflect enough. sunlight. >> This is 10 AU. Yeah. >> Is that what you mean? Okay. And um so I. did a calculation about 15 years ago. where I said in collaboration with Ed. Turner, a colleague of mine from. Princeton. I said, "What if there are. artificial lights in the outer solar. system?" Okay, would we detect them? So. at the time there was the Hubble Space.

Telescope and we asked them how if if. you take the deepest images of the. Hubble Space Telescope, how much light. can you detect? And we found that from. the distance of Pluto, we would be able to see a city like uh. Tokyo. >> Okay. It's still pretty pretty difficult. to see. >> Yeah. But a city like Tokyo consumes a. small fraction of the power supply on. Earth, you know, >> and um. >> there could be some infrastructure. Yeah, it's difficult to see. So, it may.

be there. Uh, and the way for you to. figure it out, if you were to observe a. point of light, is that as this object. um recedes away from the sun, it gets. dimmer faster if it reflects sunlight. than if it generates its own light. Another way to look at it, if you have a. technological object approaching us, it. will get brighter faster than uh just. the reflection of sunlight makes it. brighter. That's because the amount of. sunlight impinging on its surface.

declines inversely with distance squared. and then it sends out the reflected. light in our direction and you have. another factor of one over distance. square. So altogether one of a distance. to the four. I had a visitor to my. office. um. uh who discovered most of the coiper. belt many of the coer belt objects. um and I asked him he's from Caltech and. um the minute he sat in my sofa I said.

look I just wrote this paper that if an. object generates its own light uh the. brightness will increase inversely with. distance squared. And. if it's reflecting sunlight, it will. change inversely with distance to the. fourth. Did you ever check if the. objects you discovered in the coer belt. follow one or the other lows? And he. said, "Why should I check? [laughter] It. must be one of the distance to the. fourth." That's the answer from the.

person who discovered. many of the quiper belt objects. >> Why check? >> Why check? >> Oh my goodness. So then you ask. yourself, okay, is there any evidence. for extraterrestrial technological. signatures? And you answer, no, no, no, we haven't detected anything. Why? Because we're not trying to detect. anything. And when someone suggests that. there is an anomaly that we should. attend to, we cut it out of the. scientific literature. >> Did you see anomalies with Atlas as. well? >> Yeah. So aside from it coming in the.

plane of the planets around the sun. >> um there was um. until it came closest to the sun there. was much more nickel than iron detected. around it meaning that um it's anomalous. because in all astrophysical objects you. find nickel and iron at similar amounts. they are produced by the same process of. exploding star supernovi and this is the. first case where you see nickel with. with no det protection of iron. So the.

only other place where you see it is. industrial production of nickel alloys. that are used for aerospace. applications. So I pointed this out and. but the the people who wrote the. scientific paper reporting about that. said well maybe the same carbonil. process that is used by our industries. to separate iron from nickel operates in. nature. So that was in the published. literature. Eventually the statement. made that it's obviously natural and it. it illustrates the fact that the.

carbonal process used by our industries. also happens in nature. >> This this is very strange. So we have. hypothesis A well we've never seen that. before so it's false. And then. hypothesis B we've never seen that. before so it's true. >> Yes. [laughter]. >> Okay. >> Um so that's about the the composition. Then there is an anti tail that was. visible from the beginning opposite to. what you find in comets where the gas. and dust are pushed away from the sun. In this case, there is a jet pointing at.

the sun. Um, and in the most recent, you. know, 40 or so images from the Hubble. Space Telescope in recent months, I. analyzed them with a collaborator, an. observer from Italy, and we removed the. spherical glow around the nucleus of. three Atlas. And whatever was left. showed uh three mini jets coming from. the nucleus, equally separated from each. other. So it looks very symmetric as if. these were meant to balance uh the.

object and. >> sounds like maneuvering thrusters. >> Yeah, it could be thrusters. Um and I. didn't even bother to publish it in in. in the astrophysical journal because it. will be killed and why would I waste my. time? Uh but I did publish or submit for. publication the report about the three. jets without interpretation. Right? And. the response of the editor was this is. not of interest to the astrophysics. community. >> But you have images of the jets. Yes.

>> Yeah. >> But it's not of interest. >> So [laughter]. that was the response. Um that was the. second paper that the same editor uh. blocked without sending it to review. The first one was about the antitail. We. tried to provide a physical. interpretation explaining the ant. Is it. possible with known physics to explain. it? We tried to do that. Again, it's not. of interest to the astrophysics. community. That's what she said. >> How did you explain the anti-tail. though? I don't think.

>> we explained it in that paper. It was in. terms of fragments of ice, not dust. particles. So, there are big chunks of. ice that cannot uh be easily pushed by. sunlight backwards the way you find in. comets. uh we try to explain in terms of. either big particles of of dust or or. ice that are chunks that cannot be. pushed easily by the sun uh either solar. wind or the solar light. But at any. event again it was blocked by the same. editor and the third time was this.

report about an interstellar meteor. The. editor wrote it's not of interest to the. astrophysics community. At that point I. realized wait this journal I submitted. in the past almost yeah all the papers. that I submitted in the past were sent. to referees and I have no issue if a. referee thinks for these scientific. reasons that it shouldn't be discussed. but the editor blocking the refering. process is a very unusual situation in. three months three papers about uh.

interstellar objects and I basically. wrote an essay about it complaining. about it. Then two months later, the editor sends. a review from a referee and I said in. response I said you are gaslighting me. You told us that you don't want to send. it to referees when you saw the backlash. from me talking about it publicly. You. decided to ask a referee so that you.

will be covered and then you send me. this report and saying the paper should. not be published after you told me that. the paper should not be refereed. And it's very easy to find an a referee. that would be negative that will be. critical. >> Well, I mean because of your exposure, we all learned her name. >> Yes. >> Because that was a problem because now. we all know who she is. >> Yeah. But my point is this is not I. don't know her personally. I never met. her. Uh but it's clear that there is a. bias here and it's clear that it's. inappropriate because if she wanted to. cover as she did in the last move if she.

wanted to cover herself so that it will. not be clear that she is the one. expressing the judgment without any. anyone from the scientific community she. would have sent it to a referee that she. knows would be negative and then she. would be covered. That's a very simple. way of dealing with that. instead three. times in a row in three months in the. same journal that never does that to my. papers. And it just shows you the. situation in academia where you may ask. why aren't discoveries being made. because they are being suppressed by. people who have a preferred narrative.

which is completely inappropriate. uh and in my view um the way that um. corporations uh for example that deal. with AI or or with the internet uh they. have teams of people who are. brainstorming. Okay. And the Nobel Prize. was awarded to deep deep mind. >> Yeah. >> Um so. we are in a reality where in academia. thinking boldly is not really encouraged.

but even suppressed. Does the system. need to be changed? >> I think so. I think the biggest impact. is not on me. I don't really care. I. have a, you know, by now the skin, my. skin is tit titanium, you know. I I. don't get scratched by by those remarks. >> And people will read your research. whether it's in the journal or not. But. I worry about the young people because. if I were a young person entering the. field, I would be very worried about. saying something different than the. community says because it would impact.

my chances of getting tenure. >> So if you had a student who was going to. publish something that could be. controversial, you would advise them not. to publish it. >> Yes. No, they would immediately see the. reality. I had students that published. with me on on these topics and they see. that and say that's completely unfair. But uh the next step is that they move. to something far more traditional and uh. work on topics that everyone else knows. the and then it's very easy to publish. cuz then uh you basically say what other. people said before with nuances. You.

don't need in fact people forget what. happened 5 10 years ago. So you can even. repeat a paper that was 10 years ago. Repeat exactly the details but write it. in a slightly different way using AI and. you have a new paper that will be. accepted quickly uh for publication. And. so they realize that it's a shortcut. Um. but they have this is their chance for. survival. And unfortunately it's not the. most in intellectually. uh creative people who are selected by. this environment toxic environment. It's.

the people who are bowing to. authority and um you know we know from. the past history of science that um. sometimes you you can't bow to authority. and my argument about this subject is it. goes beyond that because in other parts. of science people are not following the. narrative of paying attention to. experiments. here. If you pay attention. to anomalies, you are uh you you face a. very tough battle to publish. Anomalies.

are the only way by which we can learn. that we're missing something. >> Of course. >> Yeah. So, so it's really in conflict. with the way uh science should be done. And I'm trying, you know, I I used to be. the parroers uh in my early training in. the military. And back then they said, you know, if you see a barbed wire on. the ground, sometimes you have to put. your body on the barbed wire so that. your your friends um will be able to go. across. And sometimes it looks to me.

like putting my body on the barb wire so. that the young generation will have a. better uh life. But I I sort of gave up. on on changing the opinion of senior. members of academia because they're. unreasonable. >> But the work is still important to. continue. Yes, >> definitely. I'm uh doing it and I'm. collaborating with younger people that. uh I have great hopes in discussing. this. uh but at the same time you know.

what would happen if the US government. were to disclose uh some uh information. that bears on this question are we alone. how would my colleagues respond to that. to me is the best you know disinfection. by by shedding light on the on the. evidence the best way to disinfect. uh the stubbornness of academia. >> well didn't the government um endorse. that comment that was found that they. said it extra solar and then the one.

that with Papa New Guinea. >> Oh yeah. So in fact back then I chaired. the board on physics and astronomy of. the nationalmies. Uh my student uh. helped me uh find this meteor in the. NASA catalog that was moving at 60 km/s. outside the solar system from 2014. And uh the reviewer of the paper said. uh we don't believe the US government. The data must be faulty. Um and so I.

reached out through the White House to. the US Space Command. Um but I basically. expressed my frustration at dinner of. this board on physics and astronomy and. one of the members helped me reach out. to the US space command and we ended up. with a letter from the US space command. to NASA stating that the 99.99%. confidence this object is interstellar. in origin based on the data that they. have access to. So not the published. data but all the data they have access. to. uh some of it is classified maybe.

because it comes from satellites that. are used to monitor for example. ballistic missiles right now. Um so at. any event this letter convinced me to. lead an expedition but uh it didn't. change the opinion of my colleagues that. the paper got published based on the. letter but after that there were other. papers written saying we don't believe. the US government this not this is not. an interstellar object uh because the US. government makes mistakes. Uh and then.

they also said you went to the wrong. place. Uh all kinds of arguments. What. you found is humanmade. >> Well, do you want to tell the story. about that? Because look, no matter I. followed the story, the sphererals and. the seismic data, I followed all of. that. Even if it turns out that that that it's. not extra solar, whatever it is, I think. it's a very important mission because. you've got a Harvard scientist rents a. boat, drags a magnet across the Pacific. Ocean. That's that's exciting. It's very. exciting. >> That's what makes science fun. It.

doesn't. >> You don't even need to be right. You. just need to get people excited about. it. >> By the way, this was my first. expedition. And there were lots of. hurdles along the way. I had to get $1.5. million to fund it. Uh I got it and then. I had to bring a a team of experts, the. people that know how to build uh a sled. covered with magnets, put it on the. ocean floor. Then I had to worry about. whether we bring back anything, you. know, because. >> Didn't you bring your daughter on this. adventure? Did you bring your daughter?

No. >> No. No. Okay. >> I mean, yeah, she was young. Both of. them were young. I have two daughters. >> Um, >> yeah. But so what's that like on the. boat? Is is the crew excited? >> I I slept on the sofa uh in the. conference room cuz I was uh full-time. engaged. every time they would bring the. sled back and we had to go and sometimes. it was raining and and and basically. scrapped the magnets for any material. collected from the ocean floor. At first. this sled was basically um kiting just.

like a kite. was um uh not touching the. floor and we had uh some exceptional. people on this team that enabled that. and uh eventually we collected materials. but then I had to worry about bringing. the materials back and then finding a a. very reliable. world recognized. uh geocchemist who happens to be Stein. Jacobson at Harvard has a a full team. with state-of-the-art instruments and I.

brought it I. You know it was in principle he could. have said I have no time for your your. mission and he agreed to analyze the. data and we published papers talking. about chemical composition of some of. the material 10% of it which is not. solar system abundance pattern. >> this is burillium lantham and uranium. why is that unusual that that. combination. >> well it's they they come at a thousand. times higher abundance these elements. that you just mentioned compared to. solar system materials and we said okay. where is it from we've never seen that.

before. This is a new composition never. found in any other place. Um, >> so tell us about the rebuttal. The. rebuttal paper says it's it's like. industrial. >> No. So we then checked. So they said. it's Oh, it may be coal ash. >> Coal ash. That's right. >> So we had to go to check the. composition, you know, the abundance. pattern of coal ash, compared it, and. it's not the same. >> It's not the same. >> By orders of magnitude. And um then they. said, well, maybe it's these are. tectides. So we we check tectites and so.

you know you keep doing that and every. time someone and then someone wrote a. paper oh you you went to the wrong place. because uh this seismic signal that was. detected on Papua New Guinea was not. related to this meteor. It may have been. a truck passing by. Yes. And I said well. we relied going there we relied on the. light emitted from the fireball that was. detected by US government satellites not. on the sysmometer. the mmometer was just. to say there was an event at the same. time, you know, like this, but we went.

back and forth across a region of 10 km. in size that was localized by the US. government satellite data. Anyway, so um. >> so this isn't settled yet. This is an. ongoing. >> Well, we now are analyzing isotopes and. I hope soon we will have something. interesting to to um are going to go. back to. >> report because isotopes cannot be. modified. The abundances of isotopes. cannot be modified by chemical process. on on the surface of a planet like. Earth. Uh if we see an anomaly in the. isotope composition, then it's clearly.

from outside the solar system. >> Right. And maybe explain that because I. don't think people understand that all. these these celestial bodies have their. own isotopal signature. Yes. >> Because isotopes are just um um elements. that have the same number of protons. uh so they have the same number of. electrons in an atom because electrons. balance the protons to make it neutral. the atom. So in terms of the chemical. interactions of the atom all you care. about is how uh how many electrons are.

bound to it because the chemical. interactions are mediated by the. electrons and that reflects the number. of protons. But you can add neutrons to. the nucleus and they would change. nothing in terms of the chemical. properties. Right? And so isotopes have. different number of neutrons for an. element that has a certain number of. protons in it or electrons. And um in. order to change the number of neutrons, you really need to put this element. through a nuclear furnace, you know, and. that requires tens of millions of.

degrees. You that can happen in the. centers of stars. Once you produce the. elements, you know, they maintain their. isotopic ratio from the cloud that made. the solar system, for example. And if. you bring material from another cloud. that was far away, it had a different. abundance of isotopes because they came. from another exploding star that was not. the same, you know. And so you can tell. if material is not from the source. So. anyway, we are now about to release some.

the findings of the isotopic analysis. And of course, these critics, you know, they don't have access to the materials. yet. They make they make a lot of noise. Uh, and I don't really care about these. people, you know, because we have the. materials. You know, we invested a lot. of time getting the materials. And I I. let the laboratory of Stein Jacobson do. its job uh without any interfer. intervention. and they um you know do. basically following the standard.

scientific procedure and using the best. instruments possible. But in the context. of formua mua I wanted to mention one. other thing. 3 years later after a mua. mua was discovered 3 years later there. was another object uh that was found by. the same telescope in Hawaii. They found. it in August 2020. So it was given the. name 2020. >> 20 Do I know that object? This is not. Borisoft. No, no, no. That's and that is. an object from the solar system. It.

turns out it's not interstellar. >> Okay. >> And. >> turns out that object in 2020 was. definitely pushed away from the sun by. reflecting sunlight. They saw that it. deviates from its path just the way I. was discussing omu mua interpreting mua. >> So it can work. >> But then they ask, okay, what is this. object? You didn't hear about it because. there was never a paper written on it. We within a few months they took a. spectrum of the light reflected uh.

coming from the object and they found. that it's made of stainless steel. >> Wow. >> And it was actually they realized this. is the upper stage of a 1966. uh. >> I remember I remember this now. >> towards the moon. >> Yes. And um so it's definitely. technological and the reason it's pushed. by sunlight because it had thin walls. this enclosure and um the you know we. know that it's technological because we. produced it. Question is who produced.

auam muay just a proof of principle that. this idea works. There was another. example of January 2nd 2025 a year ago. Um there was the minor planet center. that basically cataloges all objects. coming close to earth. They announced a. near-earth asteroid. and they said. we put it in the catalog as one of the. near-Earth asteroids and within a day. they realized that it follows the path.

of the Tesla roadster the car that was. launched by SpaceX. >> Oh no. >> So then they said sorry we take it out. of the catalog. It's not a rock. It's a. car. [laughter]. Our mistake. It's a car. We know that. it's a car because humanity launched it. >> Now, just imagine a car like that coming. into the solar system will appear as a. point of light because it reflects. sunlight. And the same organization, the. minor planet center cataloging it. definitely will catalog it as a rock.

>> It's a It's a strange rock. >> It's a strange rock. >> Car- shaped rock. >> Yeah. because we were not involved in. the launch of this interstellar car. And. it's obvious to anyone that looks at. these instances that that we can be. easily misled by conventional thinking. about interstellar objects. >> It's one of my favorite uh metaphors. that you use is about the people who. study the zebra. >> Yes. >> Could you how does that go? >> Yeah. if they are experts on zebras and.

they see an elephant, they would argue. it's a zebra without stripes. Uh, and the reason I bring this up is. because Mua was cataloged by comet. experts. Most recently, just over the. past year, they say most likely Mua Mua. is a comet. without a tail, without any gas around. it, a dark comet. This is a comet where. you don't see evidence for a tail.

>> A comet that doesn't look or act like a. comet. >> Exactly. [laughter] So I say I just I'm. just like the kid in Hans Christian. Anderson's tale who says, "Look, I don't. I don't see any clothes on this. emperor." And the adults in the room are. telling the kid, "Of course, the emperor has clothes. They are just invisible.". >> Yep. So, I'm I'm happy to be regarded as. a kid that um uh tells the truth or at. least what appears to be the truth based.

on the evidence. >> So, are you still convinced Mua was was. artificial? >> I think it's quite possible that it's. space trash. >> Space trash. >> Uh because and I'll tell you why. Uh. there should have been given that Omua. Mua is uh 20 times smaller in in length. than three Atlas that means that its. mass. is 20 cubed times smaller. >> right. >> and you know we're talking about maybe.

uh 10,000 times smaller than 3 atlas. Okay. So u that means that there should. be of order 10,000 or more muas for any. three atlas that you observe and the. size of three atlas is now uh based on. the latest Hubble space telescope data. Okay. So we haven't seen 10,000 omuam. muas. Uh you know you have when you look. at rocks there there there is roughly an. equal amount of mass. uh per uh logarithmic mass interval of.

of a rock uh in in space. So you have. roughly the same total mass in rocks. that are let's say 100 mters in size. compared to rocks that are kilometers in. size roughly speaking or 10 kilometers. in size. Uh so there are many fewer. objects that are 10 time there are 10. times less objects that are 10 times. more massive. So if omua mua is one part. in in in 10,000 of the mass of three.

atlas and it could be even less than. that we should have seen 10,000 muas. before seeing three atlas. We haven't. So what's going on here? I mean I I I of. course with the Reubin telescope we. might find many more and and so that. would settle the issue. >> What about um through Atlas we had some. didn't we have some strange I don't want. to say maneuver but some strange. movement of that object. >> Uh there is a non-gravitational. acceleration just like with um MUA but. it's less significant.

um the deviation from the path uh that. it would follow if it follows only. gravity um is is tiny. It's um every. second it's roughly it's less than the. the thickness of the of human hair. Okay, it's it's really small deviation. >> But the the surprising fact about it is. recently I mean NASA announces the. non-gravitational acceleration. they. have their own outlet and they insisted. that the dominant uh non-gravitational.

push is away from the sun by a factor of. five compared to the other components. Then comes along a different analysis. which shows that based on all available. data it looks like the sideways push is. comparable to the push away from the. sun. And what does it show? Well, first, you know, NASA is not an oracle. That is. always right. It's sometimes wrong, you. know. And second is that um, you know,

if if it were just pockets of ice on the. surface of a rock, we would expect the. ice pointed at the sun to be heated and. therefore the push to be away from the. sun because it's the rocket effect that. is pushing it the opposite way. >> We don't see that. We see that being. pushed to this and that could be. interpreted. In fact, I'm working on a. paper right now in terms of the the. symmetric structure of three mini jets. uh that are perhaps are in the same. plane, you know, and they stabilize an. object in the plane perpendicular to the.

direction of motion and then you have. the the prominent anti-tail that is also. contributing. So altogether you have a. system of jets that gives it a push not. necessarily related to the direction of. the sun. >> So you don't like the nitrogen iceberg. theory. Well, that was suggested for Mua. Mua. Yeah. In the spirit of dark matter. Basically saying nitro nitrogen. evaporates. as a result of being exposed to sunlight. and therefore and we might not detect it. cuz usually we see dust or carbon- based.

gas molecules but nitrogen would not. would not be visible. So it's a way of. making the tail invisible to us. uh. except that um solid nitrogen, you know, even if you use all the solid nitrogen. that you can imagine from all stars in. the Milky Way galaxy, you run short. There is not enough to produce a large. enough population of nitrogen icebergs. And um we pointed this out. It's a.

simple argument on the mass budget. And. the author of the nitrogen uh hypothesis. got furious and started attacking me. personally on any possible in any. possible way. >> personally. >> Yeah. So uh including the expedition including. everything just because we did a. calculation of the mass budget. I mean, >> have you paid a personal price or. professional price for speaking out? Like, is it strange with with the. faculty at Harvard or. >> Well, no. I mean, anyone that knows me u.

recognizes that this is the way I do my. science. I I think of creative ideas. often that other people do not think. about. And I frankly I'm surprised uh. most of the time I have an someone comes. to my office a student or a postoc and. tells me what they're doing and I ask. that person did you check this or that. and they say wow that's an that's a. great idea I never thought about that. and then they they in some cases they. work on it for decades afterwards. decades and it takes me just a few.

seconds to hear what they're talking. about to tell them that this would be a. worthwhile research area. So it comes to. me naturally without much effort. So I. think to me it sounds like this is. common sense. You know if someone tells. me something I immediately ask them why. didn't you think about this direction. for them it's like a revelation and I've. never understood that and and I think. the reason for that is I think. differently you know I think from the. perspective of the big picture and I see. things that others don't within the.

practice of science. And so that gives. me a sense that you know I shouldn't be. swayed by what they say because there. were many instances in the past where I. suggested something like the microl. lensing. example that we mentioned and then. immediately someone would say no it's. it's not interesting but then they would. come back to me and say yeah that's. interest. So very often what happens is. if I write an idea like that. it it gets posted. someone pays attention to it. Yes,

>> that someone develops it and then keeps. doing work on it such that at some point. they stop referencing the initiator of. the idea or if I tell someone at a. conference they do it, they don't credit. me. And so there are many babies that. were born this way without me being. recognized as the originator. It's. important though because don't you think. that even undergrads are just. instinctively drawn to the narrative, drawn to the mainstream that you kind of. have to knock them off the path once in.

a while? >> And in a lecture that I gave a. colloquium at Harvard just a week ago, the front row was full of graduate. students. They recognized the potential. And even one of the senior members of. our faculty came to me afterwards and. said, "That makes a lot of sense what. you just talked about. I don't. understand why people are attacking you. It makes a lot of sense. And I said, "Yeah, that's my point.". [panting and gasps] And they must be. doing that because of either jealousy to. the public outreach that I have and you.

know there are millions of people. reading my essays on Medium. Um I. recently. >> You publish almost every day on Medium. Well, you know, it's like a fountain of. ideas and uh it doesn't take too much. effort on my side to because creativity. keeps pumping new ideas and now I'm. doing better cuz I jog every morning so. I'm in very good shape and I eat healthy. food and uh and uh surrounded by women.

and I cannot complain about you know I'm. really happy. I have two daughters and a. wife and uh so everything seems great. Um, but every now and then I I get. knocked out. And it's often done without. their free noticing. So they, you know, people are just like this editor trying. to uh do it so that nobody notices. When. someone notices, the editor corrects. what she does. And so these things do. happen that unfairly people are. attacking without me noticing against.

the rules so to speak of academia or. professional practice. Uh, but I don't. care about this and uh I'm really in a a. great place and I I do think I do hope. and I bet I I placed a bet against. Michael Shermer that by the end of 2030. uh we might have evidence beyond any. doubt that the aliens exist. uh and um. he um we put some money that will be. given to the Galileo project no matter. what because he believes in the.

scientific method the way I advocate for. my advantage relative to him is that I'm. practicing it so I can improve the. chances of finding something he can just. comment on it. >> Would disclosure from the government. qualify you for winning that bet? It. would. >> It would. Uh and by the way those uh uh. people who have um uh you know well. attended podcasts that are trying to. defend science against people like me. who are scientific practitioners you. know I I actually publish papers they.

don't uh you know these these are very. strange in my mind uh because it's just. like commentators watching a soccer. match and the commentators can say oh. the you know the way that the goal. should be scored is this or that Hey, but who are they to tell me I a player. on the field? Like I, you know, the one. difference from them is that I can. actually score the goal. They they can. just talk about it. Uh and for now. they're gaining. reputation. You know, they they a lot of.

people regard them as astrophysicists, you know, including people like Neil. Degrass Tyson. But he's not a practicing. astrophysicist. Just check his record. You know, Bill Maher, check his record. Bill Maher keeps talking about him as an. astrophysicist. He is not an astroph. because he didn't publish any paper over. the past. >> He's an entertainer. >> Yeah. He's commenting on work that other. people do that is popular within the. mainstream. His ambition is to be liked. The best way to be liked is to repeat.

narratives that you hear to basically. follow the wind where the wind blows. If. the wind will change direction, let's. say the government as a result of. Trump's directive, President Trump, uh. the government releases some data that. is conclusive beyond any doubt, then. Neil deGrasse Tyson will say, "Yeah, we. suspected that. I was talking about this. possibility for years, but now we have. the evidence. Previously, we didn't. Therefore, what I'm doing is right." And. you know they will all these.

commentators will always follow the. popular view whatever other people are. telling him but they would not pioneer a. new understanding of nature. They would. not be the ones to communicate the. evidence is here because they don't seek. the evidence. And the whole point about. doing science is the fun of seeking the. evidence. You know it's just like a kid. I feel like a kid in a chocolate store, you know, in a candy store when I'm. flooded with data because that allows me.

to argue that something is unusual. because at some point when you have so. much data, you know, the there is no way for a. dogmatist to brush it under the carpet. of traditional thinking. They can't do. that. The only reason that they are. still doing it because the data is not. conclusive enough. So I say let's seek. the data. They say no, we shouldn't seek. that data because the chance of it. existing is zero. >> Isn't the most important thing in. science just to say I don't know. >> Yeah, >> they don't like to do that.

>> So the strange situation that we are. living in right now is on the one hand. practitioners of science are refusing to. deal with some questions or to make some. statements. Not only that, they will ban. talks about these statements in their. conference and remove a sentence from. the end of a paper that raises a. possibility because there the data seems. a bit strange. Okay, they would remove. that. So you have these people at the. same time you have another community of. people making speculations like crazy.

and not making any prediction that is. testable. That is allowed because they. are smart people that are doing. mathematical gymnastics. But yet their theory is not testable. They would admit that it I asked one of. them string theories. I said if tomorrow. we do this experiment and test your. statement cuz he made a statement about. the universe. I said so suppose we do. observations and we find the universe is. not behaving the way you expected. Would. that rule out string theory? He said no. String theory will always be right. what.

>> it's my conjecture of how what the. interpretation of string theory is that. might be proven wrong but it's just one. interpretation so he can immediately. shift and continue to work on string. theory in a different ver version of it. >> it's unfalsifiable it's a logical. >> so my point is if you are if you have a. model that cannot be falsified what is. the difference between that model and a. religious cult. >> that's a very good point. >> you know uh how they that's how they.

treat it. That's how they do treat it. like religion. >> I remember, you know, when I was. younger, the religious community of. Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn in Brooklyn, uh, the Lubavichers believe that the. Lubavich rabbi will come as a messiah. Okay. After he dies. So you say that's a theory, right? We. can test it, right? So he died. That's a. data point. >> Did he come back as a messiah? Not yet.

>> Not yet. By the way, they built a a a. home for him in Israel because after the. Messiah arrives should go to Israel. Yes. They built a home with the same. architecture as his home in Brooklyn. So. he would find the toilets easily. [laughter] in Israel. >> Um and he never came back as of yet. So. then you ask those people, you say, >> "Okay, well the data shows that uh he. didn't come back. What do you make of. it? Does it rule out your theory?" And. they say, "No, we just have to wait.

>> Just wait.". >> So I had had the breakfast with a string. theorist and I asked him, "What are you. most proud about. in in your scientific career?" You know, this this guy is in his late 60s. He said, "I'm proud of a paper that I. wrote about super symmetry.". And I said, "But you are aware of the. fact that the Large Hadron Collider did. not find super symmetry. Aren't you. worried that this is incorrect?

And he said, "We just have to wait. [laughter] for the next accelerator. because it may be just around the corner. with the next accelerator." Now I ask. you, >> is there a difference between the. Lubavichers. and him? >> No difference. >> Didn't you give a talk somewhat recently. about the Messiah could be an alien. intelligence? >> That's another Yeah. So, one of the. reasons that I'm really interested in. finding. uh siblings in our family in the Milky.

Way galaxy uh is because we can learn. from them and they may be more. accomplished than we are and and I had a. group of religious scholars, theologians. that were led by uh the current. president of the Templeton Foundation. and they came to Harvard and he asked me. to address the question of whether. finding extraterrestrials will change. religious beliefs and I said I don't. think so because I have two daughters. and when the second one was born it.

didn't take away the love that I have to. the first one. >> of course. >> so imagining god as being able to attend. to one child is very limiting if you. really believe that god is all capable. then there must be many children in our. family within the milky way galaxy and. we would not lose anything out of that. uh and uh in fact If we ever met a more. accomplished sibling, the only thing. that it can trigger is jealousy that. they they reached a higher level. But.

you know, we know that siblings have. jealousy and but that's not a big deal. It's it's good to find them because. right now, you know, if you look at. textbooks about cosmology, the universe, and I wrote a few of them, uh they. regard the universe as a lonely and cold. place. and without any emotional connection to. the universe. But imagine that we have. siblings out there that we can in. principle visit cuz they visit us. If we. visit them, we will learn more about. them. I think it will develop an.

emotional connection to the universe. It. will not be lonely and cold the way it. is portrayed right now. And that's a. huge impact. We would look up at the sky. and imagine those other beings being. there. And it it could inspire us to do. better. uh it's sort of like fi finding. more additional families on your street. you know that it changes the meaning of. your existence and when you find a. partner I often make the analogy with a. dating partner you know and of course we.

never know if we go on a blind date. whether the dating partner will be. friendly or a serial killer you know. that [laughter] especially. >> you've never dated before don't give. dating advice. >> that's what my wife says [laughter]. >> um but it could something that brings us. all together. It's finally something we. have together. >> But also it can change. I mean when I. found my wife it changed the meaning of. my existence, right? So because your. reality is changing there is now some. some other intelligent being out there.

that you can connect with and uh that's. why I feel very strongly that we should. do the search and then what do you find. people not only are not allocating funds. to the search but saying we should look. for microbes. Now, the one advice I can. definitely give on dates is when you go. on a on a date, aim high, don't aim low. Uh meaning it's much better to meet a. partner that is smarter than you are.

>> I did. [laughter]. >> Jen, are you listening? >> She is probably not. She hasn't watched. the show. >> Anyway, uh but what my colleagues are. aiming at is microbes. I would be bored. with a dating partner that looks like a. microbe, you know, like, okay, we know. that there is life out there, but and we. also [clears throat] know that on dates, the most common partners you would find. are mediocre. So, yeah, it's quite. likely that there are many more microbes. than intelligent beings. But why don't. we aim high?

>> So, you're not excited about maybe Mars? I'm I'm pretty confident that Mars a few. billion years ago had liquid water on. the surface because we see the impact of. the liquid water on the surface. >> conditions where it had an atmosphere. and it existed for a couple of billion. years and we know that on Earth a twin. uh planet life was welldeveloped by the. time that Mars lost its atmosphere and.

liquid water on the surface. So it's. extremely likely that Mars had life. In. fact, it may have had it before Earth. because it's a smaller body and uh. objects cool based on the surface area. Uh and the amount of heat that they have. from the formation is proportional to. their volume. So if you consider planet. that is smaller, there is more surface. area per unit volume the smaller you. make it. So uh Mars is smaller and must. have cooled earlier than Earth. So it.

may have had life before earth and we. are talking about difference in hundreds. of millions of years. And the the most. the universal the last universal common. ancestor it's called LUCA was dated at. 4.2 billion years ago. That's the the. source of all forms of life as we know. it on Earth. 4.2 two billion years ago. is just around the time when life from. Mars could have been delivered to Earth. by rocks. And if that never happened,

Earth could have delivered rocks with. life to Mars. So, I'm pretty confident. there was life on Mars, I don't think it. would shock me in any way. Primitive. life for sure. Whether intelligent life. developed within two billion years, you. know, twice as fast as it developed here. on Earth, that remains to be seen. Uh uh. one way to find out is to go into these. caves on Mars. >> Yes. >> Um you know these lava tubes and put a. drone inside of them to search for. prehistoric paintings on the walls of.

these caves. >> Wow. That's that's a great statement. That's um Do you have time for one more. segment, Obby? >> Oh yeah, definitely. >> Let's take a quick break and I want to. come back with just some rapid fire. science questions for you. >> Yeah, that' be wonderful. >> We'll be right back. >> U back with Avi Lo. So, I just I maybe. these are wacky questions, but you're. here and it's I'm I don't get a. physicist in here very often. >> There are no wacky questions. There are. only wacky answers. >> Um, something that bothers me about. aliens being here is I can't get my mind.

around the distances. So, you're aware of some theories of. Albuquery's warp drive and all of that. >> How practical is that? How feasible is. that? Can you explain that? How that. works? >> Yeah. So. this is a solution to Albert Einstein's. equations of gravity which regard. gravity as curvature of spaceime. So the. way to think of this we know the earth. moves around the sun. Uh and we tend to. think that there is a force gravity.

connecting the earth to the sun. However, another way to think of it, which was Einstein's insight, was to. think about a marble moving uh on a. trump the surface of a trampoline, the. the rubber surface which is curved as a. result of putting a a heavy object in. the middle. Um and so um like a a. bowling ball, okay, you put in the. middle and then the and then if you give. the marble the right speed, it will move.

on this curved rubber in a circle. Uh. just like the earth moves around the sun. and it's simply because of the curvature. of spaceime that the earth is trying to. go along a straight line, but the space. time is curved and therefore it moves in. a circle. And if you were to remove the. sun, the source of gravity, the earth. would leave the solar system on a. straight line. In the same way that if. you remove the bowling ball from the. trampoline, the marble will continue to.

move on a straight line on the flat. surface of the trampoline. So that's the. way Einstein thought about it. Now you. can imagine a solution to Einstein's. equations that involves curved. spacetime. And indeed there is this solution where. um it's curved in a very unusual way. such that it can propel an object in at. a constant speed. >> So because light speed is the limit. So. this is a way around the light speeded.

limit. >> as long as you can reach uh the. configuration that this solution. embodies and it requires some form of. energy that produces negative gravity. which we don't have. We we never. engineered it. The universe accelerates. Um so there is some repulsive gravity. acting on the expansion of the universe. But the substance that causes that. expansion, dark energy, you know, you would need to somehow.

engineer it in a different way because. it it fills uniformly the universe just. as if it's the vacuum energy density. But [snorts] um the question is is there. any anti-gravity source that we can. shape and have quantum gravity engineers. design an object like that? The object. itself is a solution to a steady state. where this object is moving but we don't. know how to produce it and what.

ingredients you need to put. I mean you. can imagine a cake that is extremely. tasty but you you just don't have the. ingredients to make that cake or you. don't have the oven to make that cake. So that's the way you should think about. it. I can give you another example of a. situation where you don't need rocket. fuel to propel yourself. Just imagine we. had access to a negative mass. You know. all the masses that we know about are. positive and that's why gravity is. attractive. But in electromagnetism we. have positive and negative charges. So.

imagine that just like electromagnetism. we would have negative masses and they. would repel an object close to them. So now I take the negative mass, put. next to it a positive mass of the same. value and the total mass of this system. would be zero. And that means that if I. put it here in the middle of this room, it would float. Gravity will not bring. it down. If Newton's apple was made of a. negative mass, half of it negative mass,

half of it positive mass, it would the. apple would never fall on Newton's head, you know, like. >> right. Um, and if I were to make it. negative, you know, in principle, next. to a negative mass, you can produce. repulsive gravity that would propel. objects away. Now, the point is this. zero mass object which with positive and. negative it's it's like a dipole. Um, that you can just give a nudge and it. will escape the pool of the earth. And. uh just think how much energy we invest.

in lifting a payload away from the. earth. Most of the size of Starship, the. rocket that Elon Musk is working on, the. biggest rocket we ever produced, most of. the mass of it is the fuel reservoir. And getting rid of that and just taking. the the payload, putting next to it a. payload of negative mass of the same. value, you can just nudge it. A kid, it. will just float like a balloon. and. escape the pool of the earth. No.

investment of all these uh rocket uh. fuel in in in lifting it out. And such. an object um you know would be an ideal. vehicle cuz you can accelerate or. decelerate by uh pushing the the. negative mass relative to the positive. mass or or vice versa. And uh so we just. the only problem is we don't have access. to negative mass. We we don't know how. to produce it. >> Do we have to solve the super symmetry.

problem, the hierarchy problem first? >> We have to understand how to unify. quantum mechanics and gravity. And the. most popular idea in this direction is. string theory that we discussed. But at. the moment they don't, you know, make. any predictions not to speak about. engineering. prospects for for doing something with. quantum gravity. So we're sort of lost. But if we do detect. an an object manufactured by another. civilization that maneuvers in ways that.

are very different than the rocketry um. and um accelerates to very high speeds. and perhaps they mastered this. technology. So we cannot say that it's. impossible. By the way, if we had access. to negative mass, we could build a time. machine. You could go back. >> You're going through my whole whole. listed right here. That's great. No, cuz. I'm because if you control gravity, you. control time, it's they're it's the. same. >> Yeah, you can get back in time and then. the question is um well, if you are to.

meet your grandparents and convince them. not to get married, how can you actually. exist? >> The the grandfather paradox. >> Yeah. So, um most physicists, if you. were to ask them, would argue it's not. possible because you get into logical. inconsistencies. But maybe it's possible with some. caveats like you know any legal document. has caveats. So maybe you can never. speak to your grandparents in a way that. will convince them not to get married.

because you wouldn't be able to say that. or you wouldn't remember that your brain. the memories depend on the error of. time. So maybe you would you wouldn't be. able to design a system that will go. back and do a task for you because as. you go back in time the system would. change. There's there's a somewhat. recent theory about time travel. regarding block universe theory where. you can't go back and kill your. grandfather because you didn't. Well, how do you know I didn't? Because you. because you're here, so you didn't. So, that's that's kind of solves a paradox.

>> Um, one way that I phrase it is um that. no Jew no Jewish person had access to. the to a time machine in the future. Why do I know that? Because they would. go back in time and kill Hitler. >> Sure. and avoid the loss of 6 million. Jews. And the fact that still the. history books and all the evidence we. have is that Hitler existed means that. no Jew had access to a time machine in. our future. >> Which you think is more likely that sort.

of the the block universe, one timeline. or a multiverse. >> Okay. So the multiverse I'm really um. unclear about because it's talking about. what lies beyond the horizon that we can. see. You know, everything that we see in. the universe is out to a distance that. light traveled since the big bang. It's. a limited volume. We can't know what. what's outside of it. And then you have. people telling us, oh, out there, you. know, the rules would be very different. The conditions might be very different.

That's the multiverse. And I say, I just. don't know. You know, obviously, you can. spend your life speculating. I don't. want to do that. We have a limited time. Let's focus on problems that we can. solve within our cosmic horizon. If they. were to come, those people that advocate. for the multiverse were to come and say, "Here is an experimental test that if. you do this experiment within our. universe, you would know what lies. beyond it." Then I would say, "Great, that's physics." But just talking about, you know, it reminds me of all the.

promises made to suicide bombers. Uh. they can never go back and sue whoever. sold them the wrong wrong ideas. What about um regarding multiverse? What. do you think is happening with the. double slit experiment? >> That's a fundamental uh question about. quantum mechanics that we don't fully. understand. So the debate goes back to. the beginning of quantum mechanics. Um I. [snorts] visited in August 2025, I I.

attended a conference at the Nilsbore. Institute in Copenhagen. Beautiful. place. Um, as I entered the conference. room, the the auditorium, uh, I realized. it looks familiar cuz that's the place. where the uh, some of the most famous. conferences from quantum mechanics were. held when Neil's B was around. And I sat. on on the bench, the wooden bench. They. told me, "Oh, you're sitting exactly. where Warf Gang Pie sat 95 years ago.". And I said, the only thing I could think.

when they said that is. this bench is extremely uncomfortable. [laughter]. because and I thought to myself, what. kind of quality of life did they have. back then if they were happy with this. bench? Because you can make a much more. comfortable chair right now. So why. would they sit on this wooden but. apparently they did not have high. quality life back then? And those. distinguished physicists were sitting on. this wooden bench. Uh, and um, but I. would trade everything I have for going.

back 95 years because it was a fun time. of realizing something completely new. about the physical reality nobody else. knew before. And that is illustrated by. the debate between Neilsborn and Albert. Einstein. Albert Einstein thought, oh, it's business as usual. We just need to. find some parameters perhaps that we're. missing that would allow us to forecast. how a quantum system behaves. And. Neilsbore said no what you see is what. you get. You know like this is reality.

in a completely different way. Uh and in. fact there is no classical physics. It's. just an approximation to quantum. mechanics which is the currently adopted. view. And Einstein resisted that and he. actually wrote a paper between 1935. uh and 1940 that argue that quantum. mechanics doesn't have spooky action at. a distance. >> Right? >> And he was wrong. The Nobel Prize was. awarded. He also was wrong on two other. things. He said black holes don't exist. Gravitational waves do not exist.

>> Just shows you that people working at. the frontiers make mistakes. But uh. those people that corrected Einstein got. the Nobel Prize over the past decade in. all three uh issues. Um so coming back. you know Neils Bore was right but we. still don't understand uh and you know. most of those decades of physics. confirmed quantum mechanics to exquisite. precision meaning we can calculate. things but we don't understand. And it.

brought the the phrase uh shut up and. calculate like if you [laughter] ask too. many questions you know just like you. tell a kid don't ask so many questions. just use this as a way to predict things. and and you will get agreement with. experiments which has been true but. there is something we are missing now I. wouldn't be surprised if what we are. missing has to do with gravity that um. because we have quantum mechanics. without gravity. we have this distorted view about how. quantum mechanics operates and we don't.

fully understand it. Uh you know a. system can be very big and if you affect. if you do something to part of the. quantum system the other part knows. immediately faster than light. Y. >> uh and so that's the spooky action at. the distance and quantum entanglement is. come derived from that and we don't. understand it perhaps because we don't. have quantum gravity understanding and. uh once we figure out what is missing. perhaps we'll have a full quantum. gravity theory. So uh it may not it may.

have nothing to do with extra dimensions. the way string theory operates. Uh I. don't know what it is but uh if I had to. guess I would say it must be something. that we are missing that perhaps has to. do with the way gravity operates. combined with quantum mechanics which we. don't know how to marry these two things. you know as of now. >> Could it be a graviton carrying that. information from. >> well that's part of the so-called. semiclassical picture that we have of. gravitational waves as a collection of.

gravitons. We've never detected a a. particle of gravity, a graviton on its. own, you know, like a single particle. like we detect a single photon. and um a particle of light. And so um. we can talk about gravitons but it. doesn't give us a quantum theory of. gravity. It's just um uh it's just a. phenomenological way of approaching um. uh in a semi-class way um uh how to. describe gravity. But there are other.

derivatives that are done in this way. and for example um Steven Hawking uh. decided at some point to prove a. graduate student at Princeton wrong. The. the graduate student's name uh is Jacob. Beckinstein back in 1970. He said well. Hawking showed that if you take two. black holes you can associate a surface. area around them that's the event. horizon. >> um you know whatever gets inside cannot. live it's the ultimate prison it's just.

like Las Vegas what happens there stays. there. >> right. >> uh and. showed that if you take two black holes. and combine them merge them to make a. bigger black hole the surface area can. only increase so bestein said as a. student he said, "Well, that reminds me. of the second law of thermodynamics. because maybe this the entropy of the. black hole is proportional to its area. So then entropy always increases and. that will explain it." And uh he his. mentor his advisor was John Willer at.

Princeton. He said this is such a crazy. idea that it may be right. And uh Stephen Hawking heard him speak. at a conference and he said that's. complete nonsense. So he wanted to prove him wrong. Jacob. Beenstein's wrong and and worked on the. problem and did a semi-class calculation. and showed that the vacuum near a black. hole is indeed different from the vacuum. far away. So that there is thermal.

radiation coming out from the distorted. spacetime near the horizon of a black. hole and basically demonstrated that. Beckenstein was correct. There is. entropy there. There is a thermal. radiation. There is a temperature to. black holes. they radiate. This is. called uh Hawking temperature, Hawking. radiation. It's his biggest. accomplishment that resulted from him. trying to prove wrong Beckinstein. And. what this demonstrates is how in science. if you are confident that some something.

else is wrong, try and prove it, okay? And argue with it because you might. realize that you are wrong. Uh and. that's the way good science is done. and. actually got Hawking got his his fame. out of this attempt to disprove. Beckenstein and it's called the. Beckenstein Hawking entropy. >> if that entropy so that that's been. proven that's there. >> no it we didn't detect it but we expect. it to be there there are big issues. because the radiation comes out as.

thermal radiation with very little. information in it just the temperature. uh and um. >> because it's ignoring gravity isn't it. >> well the curvature of spaceime is the. origin of of of this radiation the the. next to the horizon. And the problem is. if you throw an encyclopedia into the. black hole and then you the only thing. you get out is thermal radiation that is. characterized just by the temperature as. a function of time and eventually the. black hole shrinks and loses all of its. mass to this radiation and it's. basically an explosion. It loses but it.

takes a long time for the astrophysical. black holes. If we had tiny black holes. the mass of asteroids they would. evaporate within the age of the. universe. We haven't seen any because. maybe they were never produced in the. universe, small ones. But the point is. it it it uh creates a new headache for. theoretical physicists because where did. the information go to if the black hole. evaporates. uh and we dumped information into it? Is. it recorded somewhere in the in the. radiation or not? And and that's still.

being debated. It's an unsolved problem. even with people that use string theory. and um so um we don't know if Hawking. radiation exists because we haven't. detected primordial black holes that are. small enough to create it. We haven't. seen it. >> Does the math allow for it? >> Yeah, >> it does. This was this was your area of. expertise, wasn't it? Black holes. You. could imagine uh the early universe um. having inomogeneities meaning some.

regions that are much denser than. average instead of expanding with the. rest of the universe collapsing to a. black hole. And back then in the. fraction of a second after the big bang. those black holes would have the mass of. an asteroid or smaller than that the. mass of a dust particle down to that. Um. the smallest black hole we can imagine. has a mass of. uh uh 10 ^ minus5 of a gram. That's.

called the plunk mass. The smallest. because what happens for those black. holes um the their size the horizon size. is equal to the wavelength of the. radiation emitted by them. So it's a. sort of an object the smallest black. hole you can imagine because it will. immediately evaporate. Um but um you know if the universe had. dense regions that collapse to make. black holes, these could be the dark. matter as long as they don't evaporate.

For them not to evaporate within the age. of the universe, they need to be more. massive than a kilometer size asteroid. Okay? And uh so about 10 to the 15 g and. and higher would not evaporate. It's a. viable dark matter candidate. it was. ruled out by microl lensing experiments. The method that I helped develop uh they. were ruled out um down to the mass of. the moon or so or even smaller. Uh so.

basically the allowed range for dark. matter being primordial black holes that. do not evaporate uh is in the mass range. of asteroids right now. And we don't. know it's possible the dark matter is. these primordial black holes. If there. were smaller ones, we would see them. exploding and we would see photons. coming out of them and we haven't so. far. >> When they explode or evaporate, do we. get all that potential energy release. that information? >> It's like an explosive process cuz the. smaller the black hole is, the shorter. is the evaporation time. So if you start.

this process going within the age of the. universe, it will accelerate over time. and you will end up in an explosion uh. in the so Hawkings paper was called. black hole explosions. Um so we don't know if that happens um. in in in nature because there still are. some uh theoretical problems with. information paradox. Um and maybe the. the way quantum gravity should be.

formulated somehow avoids uh hawking. radiation. We don't know. >> Science fiction writers like using. singularities as a power source. >> Well, I advised to some colleagues that. work on string theory to test their. theories by entering the nearest black. hole, taking a journey there. And one of. them. said when I suggested that that I have. an ulterior motive for sending them. there. [laughter]. >> Yes, you do. What what would it look. like someone entering the event horizon?

What would that look like to the. observer watching that? >> You would see everything uh from the. universe outside the horizon because it. enters through, >> right? >> But you wouldn't be able to transmit to. send a DM, a direct message to your. friends. Uh, by the way, I asked once um. students at Harvard in my class. I said, um, if a spacecraft landed at Harvard. Square and you were invited in for a. one-way trip, would you take it? My. answer is definitely yes. I'm so. frustrated with what we're doing here on.

Earth that any trip beyond Earth would. be worthwhile. I don't know if your wife. would agree, but. >> oh uh a decade ago she said just make. sure that you leave the car keys with me. [laughter] and also that they don't ruin. the loan uh when they lift off and take. you out there. But recently uh just. several months ago I asked her again and. she said I will join you. So first this. is testimony that our marriage is okay. so far uh that now she wants to join me.

but the truth is that she's so. frustrated by reading the daily news. uh with what we are doing here on earth. that um she she gets my point and so I. definitely would go on such a trip but. the students told me something that I've. never expected they said we will only go. on board this spacecraft if we and use. Instagram to show to to share with our. friends on Earth. Uh, and I asked them,

wait a minute, why would you care about. your friends, the ones that you live on. Earth, because you would never see them. again, >> right? Millennials, they still care. >> It just it just shows you that their. priorities are not right. Like, if I. were to climb the Himalayas, the top. tallest mountain, I would care less about um what other. people see. I would just enjoy the. experience. And uh I was also asked in a. 90-minute interview uh by Natasha Zuve.

at the News Nation. It should air very. soon. Um. she said, "I'm really worried about. these aliens. You know, they they could. be dangerous." And she asked if I lose. sleep. And I said, "No." And she said, "Well, if you were to know that you will. die when you encounter them, would you. still want to meet them?" And I said, "Sure." uh because just that knowledge. by itself, the experience itself is a. thrilling experience and I would much. rather go through it and die than have a.

long life listening to news broadcast or. news nation. You know, like these are. very depressing and I listen to what's. the point about having a dull life, long. life that is dull compared to a short. life that is exciting. >> So what do you think we're seeing in the. skies? They seem to be operating their. own micro universe. These objects that. can. >> I don't know. I I want to get as much. data as possible. If the government has. it, I would love to help them figure it. out. Uh so at the moment uh within the.

Galileo project, we're looking for. unusual objects and once we record them. obviously I'll try to make sense of. them. Uh and if the US government has. that kind of data, then uh I'm happy to. help them. Uh so we shall see. I hope. that in the coming months and years. we'll know much more. I hope there is. something out there. Uh and you know if. you adopt the mindset that. there you know where is everybody there. is I have no partner out there you are.

not you will never seek a partner you. will never find it. So so I'm I prefer. to be an optimist because sometimes life. is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you. tell yourself there is someone waiting. for me out there, you might find that. someone. If you say that's heresy and. and that possibility should not be. contemplated even in a single sentence. in a published paper, then you will stay. alone and of course you will maintain. your ignorance forever. That's not a. future that I would like to be part of.

where we remain ignorant because that's. what we prefer to believe. Are there any. other scientists doing good work that. you would recommend that maybe don't get. quite the publicity that you do? >> Um the there are no well there are. scientists that um are either attending. to uh reports by other people or um they. are going to very short trips to collect. some data uh but they're not conducting. a systematic scientific study the way.

that the Galo project is doing. Um and. of course there are lots of people who. are speculating and talking about the. subject and um it's all about evidence. you see that a a picture is worth a. thousand words. I would prefer not to. speak at all just if I had it in my hand. you know the proof then I would just. show it and let's move on you know like. why do we have to talk about it? Um and. a lot of people just uh have an opinion.

Uh, it's not bad as long as you're. motivated to collect evidence and show. it publicly. >> What would you do if someone just. dropped a piece of a craft on your desk? What would be the first thing you do. with it? >> I would check it. I would check the. isotopes. I would immediately be able to. say whether it came from outside the. solar system. In fact, there were people. wanting me to to look over uh pieces, but um they never delivered it. Uh. >> there are some pieces floating around. out there. I don't know how real it is. about recovered metal from craft. that's.

arranged sort of layered in a lattice. structure that could be a wave guide. >> Right? So, but the publicly available. data is not conclusive. Um, and that's. what I would like to find something that. is beyond any reasonable doubt that you. can present to a reasonable person that. is not a member of academia and they. will apply common sense and uh it would. be obvious that this is the right. interpretation. >> A you're so hesitant. I don't know why. why you get attacked so much. You're so.

hesiting. in and out of existence, it makes me. think about zero point energy. >> How do you feel about that? Is that. real? >> Yeah, that's definitely something in in. the context of physics, that basically. means. um that the vacuum itself, if you empty. space of all the material and radiation. in it, there is something left. Now. whatever is left the vacuum um has no. observable consequence if it's uniform. throughout space and time if it's the.

same value everywhere. You know the only. reason we feel forces is there because. there are differences between the vacuum. at one point and another point or or any. entity at one point exert some force. when the the concentration of that. entity is different at different. locations. So we wouldn't expect to discover the. zero point um unless we um consider. gravity uh because in the case of. gravity if there is some energy to the.

vacuum per unit volume that's generates. a gravitational force. In fact that is. the force that appears to push the. galaxies apart in the present day. universe. It's it's triggering the. acceleration of of the expansion. the. expansion is not at a constant speed or. it's not decelerating. Um uh you know. you would expect if there was positive. mass everywhere matter and radiation. that the universe would decelerate. We. slow down its expansion as a function of. time. But what we are seeing now over.

the past half of cosmic history is that. the universe accelerated its expansion. And if you extrapolate that to the. future, every galaxy away from our own. galaxy, the Milky Way, it will be moving. faster and faster as time goes on, eventually exceeding the speed of light. So if you had a friend uh that was. sending you text messages from another. galaxy far away, uh eventually the these. messages will not make it. They will not. be able to bridge the gap that is open.

between you and the friend because the. friend is accelerating from you faster. than light. >> Right? Uh, one way to think about it is. an expanding balloon that has ants on. the surface. So, the ants walk at some. speed. Just like the speed of light for. photons, they propagate at some speed. The ants can walk and visit the entire. balloon. As as soon as the as long as. the balloon is not expanding too fast, if you expand the balloon very fast, if. you blow it up quickly, the ants would. not be able to visit um the entire.

balloon. they would be limited to a. small region and less and less of it as. it expands. And so that's the analogy. that if space itself is expanding in an. accelerated fashion in the universe then. then the photons particles of light will. not be able to bridge the gap being. opened between two different points on. the surface of the balloon. So, so as a. result we we remain isolated and all the. g if you have a friend in another galaxy. far away you would be able to know about.

their whereabouts only up to a certain. time in the future once they reach the. speed of light you won't be able to know. what's happening there it's sort of like. the horizon of a black hole some if your. friend gets into a black hole you don't. know what happens after that and the. only image you get is when the friend. crossed the horizon and it's sort of. like the final picture at the ending of. a western movie where the cowboy waves. his hand and the image freezes, right? >> That's what you would see if a friend. falls into a black hole or if a friend.

is in another galaxy in an accelerating. universe and we will be left in the dark. in empty space. The only thing available. to us is whatever is within the region. around the Milky Way galaxy that is. bound gravitationally and doesn't. participate in the expansion. So all the. stars that we see in the Milky Way will. still be here and um but in other. galaxies we won't be able to see them. anymore in the distant future.

>> Wouldn't time be slowing down as well? >> No, time keeps progressing. It's just. that the space is expanding. >> I mean as they reach the speed of light. >> Oh uh the translation between the time. in the frame of those friends and in. your frame. >> Yes. breaks down because you can't. actually learn about what happens to. them just like when someone enters a. black hole. So, >> so it's a fascinating concept. You might. say, "Oh, there wouldn't be any stars. left." No, actually the most common. stars are about a tenth of the mass of.

the sun and they can live up to 10. trillion years. You know, a thousand. times longer than the current age of the. universe. >> I didn't know they can live that long. >> Yeah. So one very fundamental question. that I wrote a paper about a decade ago. I said well these stars that are most. common a tenth of the mass of the sun. they live a thousand times longer and. they're very common so why don't we live. we live next to a low mass star like.

that a dwarf star in the future there is. much more opportunity right in the. future around such stars in the. habitable zone around them we do see. planets In fact, the nearest star to us. is Proxima Centauri. >> It's habitable zone is 20 times closer. to the star cuz it's a faint star and. and there is a planet there, Proxima B. >> Yep. >> So, why aren't we on a planet like that. in the future? Because that's the most. typical thing you would find. Um the. answer is probably these dwarf stars,

you know, because they're fainter and. they live longer. um. you have to get close to the furnace. when the furnace is very dim. Okay? So. the habitable zone is close in and then. you are vulnerable to the wind coming. from the star or to any flares on the. surface of the star, right? >> And that could rip apart, dislodge the. atmosphere of the planet. So you won't. have life as we know it on a planet in. the habitable zone around the dwarf, the.

most common dwarfs. That explains why we. live next to a star like the sun where. we can be comfortably far away from it. so that it doesn't damage the prospects. of earth retaining its atmosphere. I. mean Mars lost lost its atmosphere. We. have a reminder next to us that it can. happen. You can lose the atmosphere. We. don't understand exactly why Mars lost. its atmosphere. >> It wasn't a core issue. It may have been. it may have to had to do with the lack.

of magnetic field [snorts] keeping the. atmosphere abound. It may have been a. solar flare as mass is Mars is a smaller. body and the earth is more robust in. that sense. So my point is we should. feel that that it's a blessing to be. here on earth next to a star that is uh. in the middle of its life and within a. billion years would be too bright to. allow for liquid water on the surface of. earth. Uh for now let's enjoy the party.

while while it's lasting. [laughter] But. at the same time let's recognize the. fact that we need to leave earth in. order to survive in the long term. So if. we want to build any monuments that will. be remembered by historians of the Milky. Way galaxy, they would not, nobody would. mourn humanity if we were extinguished. tomorrow as a result of World War II. with atomic weapons or as a result of. climate change or as a result of.

something like AI taking over, whatever. scenario you have in mind. There is. nobody out there that would say, "Oh, too bad. humanity that was fun to have. around. You know, we will just die and. that would be it. And there were lots of. civilizations like ours that perished. probably. And those tragedies are not. remembered. The only way for us to be. remembered in the long term is to leave. Earth on a space platform that carries. humans in a comfortable environment. you.

know, we we started in the jungles of. Africa and you know, like. 100,000 years later, we we live in. highrises in cities. So, in the jungle, we had to fight for resources. If we get. a banana, then someone else cannot have. it. Now, we can call Door Dash or whoever, you know, get it to your front door. And. um that you know is a huge. transformation that humans were able to.

make. I I argue that going to space is. less of a leap because it will still be. technological but instead of being in a. high-rise it would be in a spacecraft. but you need to generate artificial. gravity. That's a huge investment. I. don't think going to Mars is necessarily. the ambition that we should have excite. you. No, it's just another rock and it's. even worse than [clears throat] our you. know just thinking it's not comfortable. right now. It's a desert without air. without um an atmosphere nor liquid.

water on the surface. Just think about. um if we were still with the chimpanzees. in the jungle and someone would look out. and say, "Oh, we use the bananas on this. tree, but in fact there is another group. of trees that we can get, but they have. less bananas. Let's go there." I mean. that's that's Elon Musk. So where do you. go? Enceladus, Europa. >> No, I say we build a space platform. Now. you may say, well that's a lot of money, but you know. >> what do you unlimited resources? What do. you build? >> Yeah. So we we invest $2.4 trillion a.

year on military budgets. I say let's if. we decide it's a priority because we saw. a spacecraft from another civilization. or just because we see the light. We. allocate a trillion dollars a year. I. think within this century we will put. the best architects, the best physicists. uh and the best engineers on this. project. We will be able to design a. space platform that is the size of a. city. Okay, roughly the size of three. eye atlas, >> right? uh kilometers in size and uh.

generate conditions that are comfortable. to for humans for many generations of. humans and maybe by then we will also. solve the aging issue so that there. could be humans that live throughout the. journey you know um but it's just a. matter of priorities and it will be the. Manhattan project on steroids but it. will reflect an important insight into. the future of humanity that is better. than investing the same amount of money. It's not the like the money is not.

there. The money is there. We invest it. in either trying to kill other people or. prevent other people from killing us. That's what we are doing. Putting the. trillions of dollars every year to that. purpose. I'm saying let's okay, we can. still keep doing that if you enjoy the. the mud mud wrestling. >> They enjoy it. >> Yeah, you can still do that, but let's. allocate one trillion out of the 2.4 for. to space exploration and just think. about the new technologies that we would. develop and I call it nox spaceship in.

my book interstellar it's sort of like. the ark that no built to save life from. the great flood and in this case saving. humanity's future uh with a space. platform that can accommodate humans and. of course if we see someone else did. that then it will inspire us but. this this kind of monument. of things that we send to interstellar. space that would survive for billions of. years is the only thing that will be.

remembered by. whoever writes the history books of the. Milky Way galaxy in the long-term. future. You know, here on Earth, I'm. sure that within a few decades, the. history books will be written by AI. >> Yes, they will. >> And so, we obviously need to be kind to. them so that they they don't say bad. things about humans in the future. But. if we venture to space that could be a. place where we can deliver the vision.

that we have uh you know to a much. bigger um community perhaps of other. beings and um I find that exciting. Uh I. I see that as a a messianic age because. if we see a a space platform that was. developed by another civilization, it. will perhaps inspire us to cooperate to. to live more peacefully with each other. cuz we are all in the same boat, you. know, and this boat is about to sink in. a billion years, you know, no matter. what we do. So we better cooperate and.

build something else that carries us. away from this sinking boat. And um that. is the messianic you know era that is. talked about in religions of uh peace. and prosperity and cooperation. And I. just think that the messiah will not be. a human. Uh. >> here we go. >> It might be uh from another star. That's. all because it will inspire us to do we. could reach the same conclusions on our. own. But we I I'm not naive to think.

that policy makers will change the. allocation of $2.4 $4 trillion a year, too. Military conflicts just because we. could go to space. >> So, you've got your ship. Do you know. where to point it yet? Cuz I think you. just get one shot, right? You got to get. it right. >> Or no, you can send a few of those. But, um I think if you allow it to maneuver, uh you don't need to decide the. beginning of the journey where to go. It. will be sort of like a survey similar, you know, to explorers uh over the.

centuries that found new lands. Not send. a scout. >> Yeah. Not because they knew about those. territories. You can call it the. promised land. You know, it took the the. Jewish people after left Egypt 40 years. That's because they didn't have. navigation system. They didn't have GPS, >> right? [laughter]. So instead of giving them the Ten. Commandments, you know, they would have. been much better off having a GPS. system. Uh, you know, >> they did have an arc that helped.

Yeah, that yeah, the question is what. was it? Right. Uh but um um if I would. were to give them a gift, I mean. obviously there was a reason for the 40. years they spent in the desert which was. for the older generation that adored. materialistic things, you know, which. you know, if you look at our culture. right now, this is pretty much where we. are. >> Yes, it is. >> Uh they wanted this desert generation to. to go away and it took 40 years. So, you.

know, maybe. maybe we'll go through a similar. transformation. We need 40 years for the. materialistic uh uh approach to to fade. away. But but I do think that if we send. towards some promised land, you know, if. we send spacecraft and we don't need to. know that in advance, we can just visit. places and and then figure out where is. the best place to go to. And once we. realize that we can send the. self-replicating probes to all these.

places that share the same qualities and. hope that you know just like in biology. the dandelion. flower sends its seeds in the wind right. >> some of them land on fertile ground some. not and you know dandelion the loin. flowers are still around and it was a. successful strategy for nature to send. the DNA in those uh directions that the. wind takes them and uh and we can do the. same thing and send a lot of seeds in.

many different directions and sort of. play the role of an interstellar. gardener. >> This is why I hope they're they're. they're working on gravity and solving. that problem because if you create that. drive, >> yes, >> then you can then you don't need a. generational ship. You can just see. what's over here. Ah, that wasn't great. Let's see what's over here. >> Right. When you say they, do you mean. aliens or government? [laughter]. >> I meant scientists, but it's probably. the government. Um yeah well if other. you know extraterrestrial scientists did. it already then we can uh get a.

shortcut. It would feel like cheating in. an exam where you look over the shoulder. of a person next to you and get the. answer. But. >> are you saying there don't cheat in. Harvard? >> I didn't say that. [laughter]. >> Uh. >> now there is a big issue about grading. because everyone gets an A. You know the. at Harvard that endowment is important. Well, um, yeah, but then how do you, uh, reward exceptional students? You know, the point is it's just unjust. And, um,

yeah. So, one one way is, of course, to. put a cap on the fraction of students. that get an A, which is being proposed. But another that I think is better is to. force the median grade to be somewhere. that is not A, like B, B+ or something. I grew up on the curve back in my day. >> Yeah, exactly. >> Last question, Abby. Um, should we be. changing what we're looking for when. these interstellar objects come in? Cuz. apparently they're going to come in more.

frequently than we thought. Should we be. changing what we're looking for? >> Uh, definitely. Um it may be a a a time. dependent question because in particular. if the visits uh reflect what we are. doing if they are not far and they. recognize you know it would have taken. three Atlas just about 80 years to. arrive at us uh from a distance that is. 100 times the earth sun separation. you. know, the. the Kiper belt and um uh it would have.

taken 8,000 years for it to traverse the. entire solar system all the way out to. the edge of the or cloud. So, >> the or cloud goes that far out, huh? >> 100,000 times the Earth sun separation. >> My goodness. >> Um and it's mostly empty space and we we. don't know what what's out there. The. only reason we know it exists is because. rocks, icebergs every now and then are. being sent into a trajectory, a path. that comes close to the sun. And these.

icebergs basically appear as comets. These are long period comets. So we know. that they come from far away and that. are very uh mildly bound, loosely bound. to the sun, but every now and then they. they dive in because of pertubations by. Jupiter, for example. Have you heard the. theory that there's a planet X out there. that could be throwing pl throwing rocks. this way? >> Yeah, we as I say even planets five. times larger, this is planet X, five. times larger than the the mass of Earth. out there are very difficult to detect.

Uh and so. >> cloud is still theoretical except for. the the few objects. Yes. Well, what we. see are the long period comets that. originate from icebergs being sent. closer to the sun. And as a result, we. recognize there is a whole population. out there. But we have never seen them. at those distances cuz they don't. reflect much sunlight. They move very. slowly at a speed that is. thousand times slower than the uh the. speed of the of the sun of the earth.

around the sun. So. >> So a thousand years. Um, no. Because the. the orbital time is not just the speed. If they move on a circle, it's they are. also farther away. 100,000 times farther. away. >> Oh, wow. >> So, you take 100,000. >> uh you know times a thousand that gives. you very long period. If if there is a. circular orbit at the edge of the or of. 100 million years or so, >> uh these are old objects and some of.

them are being exchanged with passing. stars presumably. So some of these. objects might have been interstellar. came from another star that passed by. because the distance to the nearest star. is twice the outer edge of the or cloud. So it means that if the nearest star has. an or cloud around it, these are just. like billiard balls that are touching. each other and space is packed with. those. You would expect most of. interstellar objects to originate from. the edge of the or clouds because they.

can easily be dislodged from they're not. bound um by you know they're not deep in. the potential well of a star. They're. sort of loosely bound and they can. easily be get kicked out and that's why. it was surpris so you would expect all. of the interstellar objects to be comets. the way that the long period comets are. Yet, you know, we saw Omu MUA without a. cometary tale. The first recognized. interstellar object. So, that's another. surprising fact about it that it wasn't. a comet. And who knows, you know, what.

is in the solar system, right? By the. way, within the orbit of the Earth. around the Sun, there are about 35. million objects that are roughly the. size of a person from interstellar. space. From interstellar space. And we. can't see them because they don't. reflect enough sunlight. So there is a. huge reservoir of interstellar rocks. that we are not aware of and once every. few years one of them collides with. earth one of those meter size rocks but.

what I'm trying to say is that our the. information we have is very limited for. example even with the Reubin Observatory. state-of-the-art if an object were to. move 10 times faster than the rocks of. the solar system or the planets of the. solar system which are moving at tens of. kilometers per second. If you had an. object moving at hundreds of kilometers. per second, it would spend very little. time in each snapshot of the sky that we. take with those telescopes, it would. appears trick, >> right? >> Uh and you know 300 kilometers/ second.

10 times more than earth's speed around. the sun is just.1%. of the speed of light. Three orders of. magnitude smaller than the speed of. light. So there is a huge range of. velocities that are larger than our. rockets that we would miss um if objects. were moving in our backyard very fast. Just think about your own backyard and. if someone passes through very quickly, you wouldn't even notice that. And. that's the situation that we're in. In.

addition to the fact that small objects. are not recognized, objects of the size of uh Voyager or. most of the space objects that we. launched uh are not being detected and. they could be all around us. >> Would you what would you have put on. Voyager's golden record? >> Oh, I would never put music from the. 60s. [laughter] uh or in fact I think. it's a sign of arrogance to imagine that. the aliens care much about us cuz if. they ever find it they are far more.

advanced and it's just like you know. it's really ridiculous uh to for. humanity to brag about our. accomplishments. >> the Beatles are three chords that's. that's all it is nothing to it. >> there is an image of a man and a woman. and if they care much about it uh I I. would much rather send you know some. spacecraft that to learn about them. because it's most likely you know it's. just like Darwin's.

principle of the fittest survives you. know for natural selection um obviously. there are lots of mediocre aliens out. there and many of them live on trees in. jungles and you know they didn't make it. yet to technology and in order for us to. meet them we have to visit their place. and start sorting through the trees you. know. Uh that's a lot of work. It takes a long. time to go from planet to planet and. search the bushes and the trees. And on. the other hand, you can just stay where.

you are and wait for someone to reach. you. These are the most accomplished. ones. These are the ones we want to. imitate. These are the dating partners. that we can meet if we aim high rather. than low and without any effort. So in. my. >> these are the ones scoring on the on the. on the curve. These are these are the. ones getting the real A's. These are the. ones that are at the top of the food. chain, not us. >> And we should learn from them and it. would inspire us and maybe they don't. exist, but let's first invest the.

billions of dollars in searching for. them before concluding anything. Uh, and. you know, in my view, this would be the. most inspiring discovery. And I have a. lot of artists that are approaching me. They appreciate it. Uh I I got two. bronze sculptures of Galileo Galile from. Greg Wyatt the sculptor. Uh and 51. watercolors from him were donated to my. office. So my office is now a museum. I then got from an artist in Florida,

Peter Tuni. I got a huge piece of art. that is bigger than my body. I had to. carry it to my office uh which basically. says history awaits. He was inspired by the kind of research. I'm doing. There was a a musician, a. songwriter from the UK, Ollie Swan, that. his manager um producer sent me his song. and. >> Aliens Are Real. >> Aliens Are Real. And I played it in my. lecture actually at Harvard a week ago.

>> That's where I heard it. >> Yeah. And um they asked me for an. endorsement. But you know it's the. greatest reward is to see all these and. and there there was a children's book. about aliens sent to me from Brazil. where a class did that. There was also a. a a book of poems that were sent to me. by Alan Wagstaff, a poet from New. Zealand. And so I feel that the artists. are inspired. Uh there was also u a new. um a painting that I received just a few.

days ago by uh an artist. and she said her last name is Denning. and and she said. um the name the title of this uh piece. is um it's a freaking. uh spacecraft. >> [laughter]. >> I'm glad that you're featuring the. artists because as important scientists. are to our society, I think artists are. equally as important to creativity. >> They are definitely. But the biggest. reward I get is from parents writing to.

me and I got hundreds of those that. their kids decide to pursue science. after hearing me on television. Uh. that's to me is the biggest blessing of. my appearances cuz uh I gave up on my. senior colleagues changing their minds. Uh, and my hope is that the young. generation of fledgling scientists will. be open-minded and we'll actually. discover all the things that my. generation missed. >> I think that's a great place to leave. things unless there's anything you.

wanted to add, Obby. >> No, I think we Well, we could have. talked for hours. >> I certainly could have have a whole. list. So, we need to um let people know. about the Galileo project. Uh, donations. wanted also your YouTube channel. We. have to get subscribers on there so you. can get all the AI imitators out, >> right? >> I was telling you earlier, I was telling. Abby that I was listening to just some. of his lectures getting ready for this. this conversation. I heard him talking. out of the corner of my ear about how th. Atlas was maneuvering through the and I.

went, "Whoa, hold on. I didn't hear. that." But it was just an AI obby. So, we need to get rid of those. >> Exactly. That's my mission right now. >> Okay. Anywhere else to find you? Your. medium page. >> My Medium page for updates every day or. so. And uh I have another book coming. out on the expedition hopefully within a. year with MIT press. Uh my previous. books might also be of interest. The. extraterrestrial which became a. bestseller uh and also Interstellar. which is what we were talking about. today. >> Both very good and I hope when that book.

comes out you'll come back and see us. >> I would be delighted. >> Uh Professor Dr. Avi, thank you so much. It's been a treat. >> Thanks for having me. >> Bye everybody. >> All right. So that's Avi Lope. And I got. to be honest, I really enjoyed that. conversation. He's not what you'd expect. from a Harvard [music] professor. There's no ego about him. The guy was. offered a spot in Israeli special forces. and said, "No, I'd rather think." And. [music] that kind of tells you. everything. So, here's what we can. verify. Aloe is the real deal. Frank. Bbear Jr., professor of science at. Harvard, chaireed the astronomy.

department for 9 years, over a thousand. published papers. He was selected for. the Tapia program, Israel's most elite. military science unit, at age 18. He got. a fellowship at the Institute for. Advanced Study at Princeton where. Einstein worked. He's tenured in Harvard. in under three years where the average. is seven. So these [music] aren't. claims, these are public record. But the. big stuff, oh more. In 2017, the first. detected interstellar object showed no. commentary tail, no visible outgassing, and yet it accelerated away from the.

sun. Avi proposed it could be a light. sail, [music] a thin flat object pushed. by solar radiation. His critics called. it a dark comet. a comet with no tail, no gas, that doesn't behave like a. comet. And he makes a fair point. At one. point is a comet that acts nothing like. a comet, just not a comet. Then there's. the Pacific expedition. In 2023, his. team dragged magnets across the ocean. floor near Papa New Guinea to recover. material from IM1. That's the first. recognized interstellar meteor, [music]. which was confirmed by US DoD data. They.

found spirals with a composition never. seen in solar system materials. [music]. burillium, lantham, and uranium at a. thousand times the expected abundance. Now, critics from institutions like the. [music] University of Chicago published. a rebuttal arguing it matched coal ash. Aby's team compared the profiles and. says the match doesn't hold. The isotope. analysis is still underway and could be. definitive. [music]. Aby brought up something I hadn't. considered though. There's a company. called Reflect Orbital applying to the. FCC right now. As in right now, [music].

to put 50,000 mirrors in orbit to beam. sunlight down to Earth at night. Now, it. sounds like a good idea until you. realize it would blind every telescope. on the planet. We wouldn't be able to. see near-Earth objects coming. And he. framed it as a potential new answer to. the Fermy paradox. Maybe civilizations. just blind themselves before they ever. see the asteroid that eventually kills. them. That's kind of scary. Now, I don't. know if OMU Mua was a light sail. It. probably wasn't. I don't know if the. sphericals from the Pacific are extra.

solar. They probably [music] are. But I. do know this. Avi Lobo is the only. scientist at this level who's actually. going out and looking. He's not. commenting from the sidelines. He built. the telescopes. He rented the boat. He's. dragging magnets. And if you watch my. episode on Panspermia, we are the. aliens, a lot of what Obby talks about. regarding life traveling between [music]. planets connects directly to that. episode. Same with the episode, the. grays are future humans. Avi even. floated that idea himself that if aliens. look human, they might just be us from.

the future. You can follow Aby's work on. his medium page where he publishes. [music] almost every day. His books, Extraterrestrial and Interstellar, are. both worth reading. And if you want to. support the Galileo project, they take. donations at the project website. He's. got a new book coming out with MIT Press. on the Pacific Expedition. That should. be interesting. Now whether he's right. or wrong, science needs [music] more. people willing to put their reputations. on the line in pursuit of something. important. And I think Avil is one of. those people, but I leave it up to you. to decide. Until next time, be safe, be. kind, and know that [music] you are.

appreciated. [music]. Oh. Oh yeah. [music]. I played in Area 51. A secret code. inside the Bible said [music] I would. I love my UFOs and paranormal fun as.

well as music [music] sanging like I. should. But then another conspiracy theory. becomes the [music] truth my friends. [singing]. and it never ends. ends. No, it never. [music] ends. [music]. I feel the crab cat. I got stuck inside. M's home with MKR. I feel only [music].

aware. Did Stanley Cubri fake the moon landing. alone on a [music] film set? I would. shadow people there. The redwelling just fought the smiling. man I'm told and his [music] name was. cold. But I can't. dancing with the fish [music] and the. fish on Thursday night.

all [music] through the night. All I ever wanted was to [music] be the. truth to the world. through the night.

[music] The math man sightings and the. solar storm still come to a gather the. secret city underground. [music]. Mysterious number stations planet circle. to project star gave and where the dark. watchers found [music]. in a simulation. Don't you worry though. the black night satellite over me. Oh, I. can't [music] believe I'm dancing with.

the fish and your fish on Thursday night. when they change you and my family. through the night. [music]. All I ever wanted was to hear the truth. all through the night. [music]. When vacant.

was to be the truth, [music]. [music]. [music]. dance. loves to dance [music] on the dance. floor because she is a camel came to.

dance when the feeling is right [music]. to dance. [music]. >> [bell]. [music].