Pluto's orbit is so elongated that it crosses the orbit of another planet. Now that's... you've got no business doing that if you want to call yourself a planet. Come on, now! There's something especially transgressive about that.
Interpretation
Pluto's irregular orbit challenges its classification as a planet in our solar system.
Neil Degrasse Tyson comments on Pluto's unique and elongated orbit, which intersects with that of other celestial bodies. This unusual characteristic raises questions about the criteria for planetary status, suggesting that to be classified as a planet, one should adhere to certain predictable patterns in their orbit, emphasizing a broader understanding of the dynamics of our solar system.
In practice
In a lecture about planetary science, you could illustrate how Pluto's orbit challenges traditional classifications.
The problem is that many people operate on the assumption that NASA should go to Congress every year with hat in hand and justify it every year. Well, I see it as the greatest economic driver that there ever was. Economic drivers don't need justification.
The press still thinks [global warming] is controversial. So they find the 1% of the scientists and put them up as if they're 50% of the research results. You in the public would have no idea that this is basically a done deal and that we're on to other problems, because the journalists are trying to give it a 50/50 story. It's not a 50/50 story. It's not. Period.
As a scientist, I want to go to Mars and back to asteroids and the Moon because I'm a scientist. But I can tell you, I'm not so naive a scientist to think that the nation might not have geopolitical reasons for going into space.
In just one year, the expenditure of of the U.S.'s military budget is equivalent to the entire 50-year running budget of NASA combined.
One of my great laments is that education today seems to have... be less about passion and more about process, more about tactic or technique.
Lots of people think, well, we're humans; we're the most intelligent and accomplished species; we're in charge. Bacteria may have a different outlook: more bacteria live and work in one linear centimeter of your lower colon than all the humans who have ever lived. That's what's going on in your digestive tract right now. Are we in charge, or are we simply hosts for bacteria? It all depends on your outlook.
The ideas which led to the Analytical Engine occurred in a manner wholly independent of any that were connected with the Difference Engine. These ideas are indeed, in their own intrinsic nature, independent of the latter engine and might equally have occurred had it never existed nor even been thought of at all.
Climate change is the 800-pound gorilla in the living room that the media dances around. But in the scientific community, it's a settled question: 95 percent of scientists believe this is happening with 100 percent confidence temperatures are rising.
When a scientist doesn't know the answer to a problem, he is ignorant. When he has a hunch as to what the result is, he is uncertain. And when he is pretty darn sure of what the result is going to be, he is in some doubt.
Cancer is a disease of the genome. And that's what happens. You make mistakes in a cell somewhere in your body that causes it to start to grow when it should've stopped, and that's cancer. And those mistakes are mistakes of DNA.
I am, and ever will be, a white socks, pocket protector, nerdy engineer.
The energy requirements for interstellar travel are so great that it is inconceivable to me that any creatures piloting their ships across the vast depths of space would do so only in order to play games with us over a period of decades. If they want to make contact, they would make contact; if not, they would save their energy and go elsewhere.
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