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That the north star is the brightest in the night sky. I'd guess about 9 out of 10 people think this. But it does not require a grant from the National Science Foundation to learn the answer. The North Star is not even in the top 40 in the night sky. It's the 49th brightest star. Rather dull and boring by most measures.

Neil deGrasse Tyson

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Neil deGrasse Tyson
Age: 66
Born: 1958
Born: October 5
Actor
Astronomer
Astrophysicist
Cosmologist
Non-Fiction Writer
Philosopher
Physicist
Science Communicator
Science Writer
Teacher
Trekkie
The Bronx
New York City
Neil Tyson
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More quotes by Neil deGrasse Tyson

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85 percent of the gravity of the universe has a point of origin about which we know nothing.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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We are star dust in the highest exalted way, called by the universe, reaching out to the universe
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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As a child, I was aware that, at night, infrared vision would reveal monsters hiding in the bedroom closet only if they were warm-blooded. But everybody knows that your average bedroom monster is reptilian and cold-blooded.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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Rational thoughts never drive people's creativity the way emotions do.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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The history of science shows that great mysteries get solved. It may be that there's an answer that humans are too stupid to understand. I'm intrigued by that possibility.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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You don't need to be a scientist to know Earth's age or that life evolved. You just need be one who embraces objective truths
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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I didn't even know there were stars to look at to not see. If you don't know that they're there, you don't know that you're missing them.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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The universe's destiny has very little to do with the near-term destiny of Earth.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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I am not the most annoying person to bring to a movie 'cause I basically hold it in and write about it later or tweet about it. The most annoying people to bring to movies, I think we all agree, are those who read the book first.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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Feeling a little small? Well, in the context of the cosmos, we are small.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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There is a theorem that colloquially translates, You cannot comb the hair on a bowling ball. ... Clearly, none of these mathematicians had Afros, because to comb an Afro is to pick it straight away from the scalp. If bowling balls had Afros, then yes, they could be combed without violation of mathematical theorems.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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The more I learn about the universe, the less convinced I am that there's any sort of benevolent force that has anything to do with it, at all.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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Perhaps we’ve never been visited by aliens because they have looked upon earth and decided there’s no sign of intelligent life.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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Unlike what you may be told in other sectors of life, when observing the universe, size does matter, which often leads to polite ‘telescope envy’ at gatherings of amateur astronomers.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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On Venus you could cook a 16-inch pepperoni pizza in seven seconds, just by holding it out to the air. (Yes, I did the math.)
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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Don't know if it's good or bad that a Google search on “Big Bang Theory” lists the sitcom before the origin of the Universe
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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I try to write in a way where you care deeply what the next paragraph will be. I hear the rhythm of prose and that, to me, distinguishes great writing from ordinary writing. By the way, I don't even claim that I'm good. I claim that I value it.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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A state of negative energy means that you are essentially getting something for nothing.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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As children we all wonder - we wonder all the time. And that gets lost in adulthood. It gets beaten out, it gets filtered out or diluted out.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
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The miniaturization of electronics, which ultimately was driven by the marketplace, was started by NASA, because it costs money to get something into orbit. So you want to trim your electronics, miniaturize your electronics, miniaturize your satellites.
Neil deGrasse Tyson