We Stopped Dreaming - Neil deGrasse Tyson

We Stopped Dreaming - Neil deGrasse Tyson

Transcript of We Stopped Dreaming by Neil deGrasse Tyson



Here’s what happened, in the 1960’s, we were at war with the Soviet Union, Cold war, and a little bit of hot war over in Vie- South East Asia. So, we fear them because they put up Sputnik. Which, by the way people forget, was an emptied out casing of an intercontinental ballistic missile. And, Sputnik itself means ‘fellow travellers’ it was all peaceful, but it was a ballistic missile head, without explosives. So that was a signal and we freaked in America. So NASA got founded on the fear factor of Sputnik. Alright, so, we then go to the moon on the fear factor that Russia will control high ground. Then, we go to the moon, space enthusiasts say “oh, we’re on the moon by ’69, we’ll be on mars in another ten years”. They completely did not understand why we got to the moon in the first place. We were at war, once we saw that Russia was not ready to land on the moon, we stopped going to the moon. That should not surprise anybody looking back on it.
Meanwhile, however, that entire era galvanized the nation. Forget the war as a driver; it galvanized us all to dream about tomorrow, to think about the homes of tomorrow, the cities of tomorrow, the food of tomorrow. Everything was future world, future land. The world’s fair, all of this was focused on enabling people to make tomorrow come. That was a cultural mindset the space program brought upon us. And, we reaped the benefits of economic growth because you had people wanting to become scientists and engineers who are the people who enable tomorrow to exist today. And, even if you are not a scientist or technologist, you will value that activity and that, in the 21st century are the foundations of tomorrow’s economies and without it we might as well just slide back to the caves, because where we are headed right now, broke.
I’m tired of saying this, but I have to say it again. The NASA budget is 4/10th of one penny on a tax dollar. If I held up a tax dollar, and I cut, horizontally into it 4/10th of one percent of its width, it does not even get you into the ink. So, I will not accept a statement that says we can’t afford it.
Do you realize that the 850 billion dollar bank bailout, that sum of money is greater than the entire 50 year running budget of NASA, and so when someone says we don’t have enough money for this space probe. I’m asking, no, it’s not that you don’t have enough money, it’s that the distribution of money that you’re spending is warped in some way that you are removing the one thing that gives people something to dream about tomorrow. The home of tomorrow, the city of tomorrow, transportation of tomorrow. All that ended in the 1970’s, after we stopped going to the moon, it all ended, we stopped dreaming. And so, I worry that decisions that Congress makes doesn’t factor in the consequences of those decisions on tomorrow. They are playing for the quarterly report, they are playing for the next election cycle and that it mortgaging the actual future of this nation. Tomorrow’s gone.
If you double NASA’s budget, right now it’s half a penny on the dollar, make it a penny, go ahead, make it a penny, go ahead, be bold.  That would be enough to go to mars soon, with people, and go back to the moon, and onto asteroids. NASA, as best as I can judge, is a force of nature like none other and so what worries me is that if you take away the manned program. A program, which if you advance frontiers you make – heroes are made. There is a force operating on the educational pipeline that will stimulate the formation of scientists, engineers, mathematicians and technologists. You birth these people into society. They are the ones that make tomorrow come.
A half a penny. That buys the space station, the space shuttles, all the NASA centers, the rovers, the Hubble telescope, all the astronauts, all of that. Nobody’s dreaming about tomorrow anymore. The most powerful agency on the dreams of a nation is currently underfunded to do what it needs to be doing, and that’s making dreams come true.
How much would you pay for the universe?

Changing Priorities

How often is it that one comes across a situation that completely changes the way one looks at the world, and priorities? Until this week, I had given up on my seemingly dream job, was happy in my current job and wanted to work towards the husband and babies life plan. Then I got a heads up about the potential opportunity to go back to my home town and partake in my dream job. I’m at the top of this list, personally mentioned by the guy in charge. Suddenly I find myself forgetting about buying a house in Calgary, forgetting about finding the man for me and being happy with a man who I’ll leave here when I potentially go back home and do my dream job.
I once heard a man say that you always have time for your passions, and that you should find your passion and figure out how to make a living doing that. His personal example was landscaping, he had started a landscaping business in high school, eventually moving on to other business ventures, and being busy busy with those. Then he gets a call from a buddy asking if he wants to help make a dirt biking track and suddenly his schedule is empty and he flies home to do extreme landscaping. I remember thinking then that I didn’t have such a passion, there’s nothing that I would drop everything to do. Nothing I believed in, cared about, that much. This week has reminded me that I do have such a passion, but it’s in such a narrow field, that it’s hard to get into, and I don’t have the sufficient education that would normally allow me to pursue it, nor do I have the desire to go around the long way and hope and pray to get into my desired department. Which, would only last a few years because they move people around very quickly.
So, with a simple cross-country text message, my priorities changed, my passion became slightly plausible. Well, in a year or so after they get a new office, and after they get funding, but it’s there. But, what do I do while I wait for the time to pass? I hate being in limbo, and that’s exactly where I am.
So, here I am, waiting for a potential job offer if they ever get funding for enough investigators to actually want an analyst...

Private: Heart Break

Has it ever happened to you that in a single action by another you can quite literally feel your heart break? Like a tear deep in your chest, it slowly rips from top to bottom.

The action can be simple, a smile at someone else, flinching away from a touch, turning over to face the other way in bed. It is rarely the first action in a series of events, but can easily be the last. The action is often so small, so seemingly inconsequential that the person who did it won't even remember.

What do you do when this is a common occurence, but due to other circumstances you can not, and don't want to, leave? How do you survive the torture of your heart breaking every month? every week? every day? What if you don't want to be set free, but just for the heart break to stop?

How do you tell someone that you want them to stay, and you wish they would stop causing your heart to break? How do you find the courage to say something when in the past they have always told you that your feelings are wrong?

How do you admit to yourself that you are in an emotionally abusive relationship?

Private: No Regrets

It is a well know idea that you should live your life with no regrets.

Your friends will often try to tell you what they think their "No Regrets" life is, and if yours is different, here comes the peer pressure.

You're so young, why do you act like you're 30?

So, what happens when you finally cave to the peer pressure, take the leap, do something crazy and stupid and act your own age? What if you regret the path you took while you were living with no regrets? What if you don't realize your mistake before the mistake can't be taken back? Now you regret the life you chose, and you have no way to get back to the life you lived.

Just because I wasn't currently being a stupid teenager does not mean that I didn't at one point act like a stupid teenager. Maybe I just got over it faster than you. Maybe six months at 18 was enough for me. Why does someone else have the right to tell me that at 22 I should still be young, stupid and free? Why couldn't I have been strong enough to tell them to go to hell and live my life the way that I actually wanted to live it?

When I was ten, or so, I figured out that there was a small trend in my family, every 9 years there was a baby born. I'm the second in the chain, and now there's four of us. So, I decided I wanted a baby at 27, assuming I had a husband and stability. I was unconsciously working towards that in my life. It was the one goal that I had. And, I destroyed it due to a little peer pressure. I currently have no hope of being settled, again, enough in three years to be pregnant.

So, what do you do when all you have is regrets and lost dreams?

I wish I knew.