If you're going to lead a space frontier, it has to be government; it'll never be private enterprise. Because the space frontier is dangerous, and it's expensive, and it has unquantified risks. And under those conditions, you cannot establish a… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
Private enterprise in the history of civilization has never led large, expensive, dangerous projects with unknown risks. That has never happened because when you combine all these factors, you cannot create a capital market valuation of that activity. — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
I don't want to go into space because of war. I think we would if it was triggered. If China said they want to… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
Quantum physics fluctuates all the time. But now the fluctuations are not just particles coming into and out of existence, which happens all the… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
In the movie, the stars above the ship bear no correspondence to any constellations in a real sky. Worse yet, while the heroine bobs...… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
... informed ignorance provides the natural state of mind for research scientists at the ever-shifting frontiers of knowledge. People who believe themselves ignorant of… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
If you seek only easy problems to solve, then ultimately, there'll be nothing about you to distinguish yourself from others. — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
The caricature of science is that we hold tight to the theories we have, and shun challenges to them. That's just not true. In… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
New generations of humans inherit the acquired discoveries of generations past, allowing cosmic insight to accumulate without limit. Each discovery of science therefore adds… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
I've said multiple times that the world's first trillionaire is going to be the person who exploits the resources of asteroids, the natural resources… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
They [scientists of centuries past] call on God only from the lonely and precarious edge of incomprehension. Where they feel certain about their explanations,… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
We explore our environment, more than we are compelled to utter poetry, when we're toddlers. We start doing that later. Before that happens, every… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image
You can't have people making decisions about the future of the world who are scientifically illiterate. That's a recipe for disaster. And I don't… — Neil deGrasse Tyson Copy Share Image