There's something about witnessing something in the sky that makes people think they're seeing something unique or special. I don't really understand the psychology of it, to be honest.
Interpretation
This quote reflects on the human tendency to perceive unique significance in celestial phenomena.
Neil Degrasse Tyson expresses an observation about how people react to visual experiences in the sky, suggesting that such moments evoke a sense of wonder and individuality. He admits a lack of understanding regarding the psychology behind this tendency, highlighting the complexities of human perception and the emotional connections we form with the cosmos.
In practice
This quote could be shared at a stargazing event to inspire participants.
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.
There are no more ideologies in the authentic sense of false consciousness, only advertisements for the world through its duplication and the provocative lie which does not seek belief but commands silence.
In violence there is often the quality of yearning - the yearning for completion. For closure. For that which is absent and would if present bring to fulfillment. For the body without which the wing is a useless frozen ornament. ("A Short Guide To The City")
The human phenomenon is but the sum Of densely coiled layers of illusion Each of which winds itself on the supreme insanity That there are persons of any kind When all there can be is mindless mirrors Laughing and screaming as they parade about in an endless dream
I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions.
Government is a contrivance of human wisdom to provide for human wants.
Men have feverishly conceived a heaven only to find it insipid, and a hell to find it ridiculous.
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