Lost Wanderer Podcast: 3/22

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Time for this nation to take a clearly leading role
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in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the
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key to our future on Earth.
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H A one all fair program on BIA.
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Today is a day from morning and remember Nancy and
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I are gained the core, but the tragedy of the
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Shuttle challenge.
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The following program may contain false language, adult themes, and
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bad attempts of human listener discretion if advised.
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What is President Trump's goal?
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What is his vision?
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He wants to put an American flag on March.
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Rifin anguality here the angle landed.
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I am J E. W F a cosmic bard over
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on X and this is the Lost Wanderer podcast from
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March twenty second, twenty twenty six, produced from the Listening
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Post Studios and satimolcast on k l RN radio. We're
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coming to you tonight from the acs Serenade Observatory, opening
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high above the night's side of Earth, where the lights
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of cities trace the continents below. US satellites are drifting
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silently along their long arcs, and beyond the blue edge
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of the atmosphere, the wider universe ulwaits in the dark.
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There are moments in spaceflight when a headline will sound technical,
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almost bureaucratic, like something only propaution engineers and procurement officers
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could possibly remotely love. This is not one of those moments,
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because when NASA says it has picked a new upper
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stage for the Space Launch System, what it really is
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saying is this the plan to get Americans back to
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the Moon has changed again, and not in some small,
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ignorable footnote buried in the margins. The architecture itself is moving.
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The bones of Artemis are being rearranged while the house
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is still under construction. Now, the headline version is simple enough.
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NASA is dropping the long discussed exploration upper stage for
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the future versions of SOLS and instead moving towards Centaur
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VIV stage used on ULA's Valkan rocket. Now that shift
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became visible in NASA's imagery, tied to the new Artemis framework,
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and was then reinforced by a federal contract listing four.
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Quote the walk in Centaur five upper stage for Space
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Launch System unquote in plane English, which I cannot apparently
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pronounce the Immune rocket. NASA has spent years promising what
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evolved one way is now evolving a different way, and
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that matters because upper stages are not decorative accessories. They
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are not cupholders in a pickup truck. They are part
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of the rocket that helps determine how well, efficiencily efficiently
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a vehicle can finish the job after the brute force
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climb out of Earth's atmosphere. They will shape PALO performance,
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mission design, cadence, and confidence Centaur five, according to space
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dot COM's reporting, carries about twice as much fuel as
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the interim cryogen propulsion stage now flying on SLS Block one,
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and it uses two URL ten engines. NASA appears to
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be betting that a standardized version of SOLS built around
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this new approach is more practical than continuing to upgrade
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the old path. H sounds like something I said about
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Oh I don't know a year ago. Not one choice
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plugs directly into the bigger Artemis shake up. Under the
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old plan, Artemis one through Artemis three would use the
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current SLS configuration with the ICPS upper stage, and later
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missions would transition to more ambitious Block one B and
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Block two versions using the Exploration upper stage. Now NASA
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is scrapping those upgrades in favor of a standardized SOLS configuration.
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Artemis four and Artisms five are the mission specifically tied
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to the new Centaur five based set up in the
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current contract picture. That is not just a hardware change.
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That is NASA admitting that the old road map was
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carrying too much weight with too many moving parts on
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a two fragile timeline.
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Hu.
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Once again, I swear I said that about a year ago.
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And while all of that was happening, Artemis two is
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suddenly back in the conversation. In a bit of a
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very real way. NASA is saying Artemis two moon rocket
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is now fixed up, allegedly and could launch as soon
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as April first, no jokes, with additional opportunities from April
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second through the sixth, and then again later in April
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and de May if needed. The world out to the
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launch pad was scheduled from March nineteenth. The NASA officials
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of the engineering teams implement it and qualified a design
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fix for the quick disconnect hardware issue that has been
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dogging the vehicle. So while the future of Artemis is
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being rewritten in broad strokes, the near term mission is
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standing there on the pad asking a a simple question,
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Can we go? Can we go yet? Can we fly now? Now? Bueller.
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On the contrast, is the real story here On a
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side note, or on one side, Artemist two is almost
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old fashioned, and its clarity for astronauts ten days, one
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loop around the Moon and back. It's clean, it's elegant.
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It's basically Apollo with better computers and much more expensive paperwork.
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On the other side, Artemis three and beyond now look
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very different from what the public was told not that
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long ago. Hmmm, good leadership will do that. Artemist three
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was originally envisioned as the first lunar landing mission, targeted
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for twenty twenty eight. Now, according to once again space
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dot Com, it's been transformed into a twenty twenty seven
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test flight in low Earth orbit involving Orion and one
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or more lunar landings. Artemis four is now the first
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mission in line expected to actually land astronauts on the Moon,
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still with the hoped for date in twenty twenty eight. Now,
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that is a remarkable change, and it tells you something
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important about the state of modern exploration. NASA is no
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longer pretending that every piece of the system will mature
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on schedule just because the powerpoints slides said it would.
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Starship readiness matters, blue moon readiness matters, Solus readiness matters,
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Orion readiness matters. And when all of these moving parts
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begin drifting out of sync, the agency has to choose
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between keeping the old script alive for basically appearances, we're
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saying screw it, and rewriting the mission order to fit
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the actual reality of the situation. And what we are
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seeing now is NASA choosing reality, even if reality is
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a bit awkward, definitely politically messy, and potentially even a
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little embarrassing. And there's also something revealing in the choice
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of Centaur FIV itself. Cintaur is not flashy. It does
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not have the mythic swagger of a giant moon rocket
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brand new from nose to tail. It's actually a little
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more pragmatic than romantic, more wrench than banner more quote
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what can we actually fly? Unquote? Then hmm, this artist
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rendering looks good. Maybe that is exactly where artemis Well
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actually should arrive. Finally, not in the age of grand declarations,
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but the age of functional compromises. Not the moonshot as
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pure national myth, but the moonshot as systems integration problems
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that can be fixed. So the big takeaway tonight is
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not that NASA picked the part. It's that NASA picked
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a philosophy. The agency seems to abandon the more elaborate
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SOLS future in favor of a leaner, standardize one, while
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also reshuffling the mission order so it can keep momentum
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instead of being trapped by its own promises. Artemists two
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may fly very soon. Artemist three is no longer the
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landing mission many thought it would be, and it's interesting
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I had not heard anything about it. The crews are
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going to get adjusted because Artemis Crew three was supposed
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to be the first humans on the Moon for the
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first time depending on where you land on that or again.
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And it was specifically picked those four astronauts for I'll
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say it, political reasons, not count not discounting that they're
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all or capable of doing the job. But you know
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why the four were picked. So it'll be interesting to
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see how if they will adjust to an Artemis four
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that will now be carrying that burden. And the rocket
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meant to return humans to the Moon is once again
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becoming a different rocket than the one we were even
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told to expect in the first place. Now, the good
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news is This does not mean the Moon is slipping away.
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It does mean the road back is being repaved while
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the convoy is already moving and it's space flight. That
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can either be a sign of collapse or a sign
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of maturity. Over the next three months, off Artemis two
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actually launches, and this new SOLS path begins to hold together,
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we may eventually find out which one of those it is.
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Now from shifting the road back to the Moon, we
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turn now to the aging station that will hold humanity's
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place in low Earth orbit together for a little while longer.
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Congress wants to keep the ISS flying until twenty thirty two.
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For years, the ISS has existed with an expiration date
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hanging over it. Everyone knew it was not meant to
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last forever, and the assumption was by that time retirement
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actually arrived, something new would be ready to take its place.
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Commercial stations would begin to rise, NASA would shift into
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a new role, and the old outpost would finally ease
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into history. But Congress, those collection of wise men and
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women and whatever that one representative is now seems to
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be looking at that plan and asking a very reasonable question,
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are we actually sure the replacement is ready? So what
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this story really means is extending the ISS to twenty
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thirty two is not just a date change. It's a
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sign that the handoff to the next era does not
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look solid enough. Yet once again, on paper, the transition
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sounds amazing the artist renders Chef's kiss, But in reality
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the ISS is still doing too much important work to
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simply seem something better will be there right on time,
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and we have to admit this work actually does matter.
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The station is not just a symbol floating overhead. It
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is still the most important human lavatory in orbit, despite
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what the Chinese may say. It is where long duration
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space flight is studied, where hardware gets tested, where astronauts
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to learn how to live and work off Earth for
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months at a time, and where there is actual international
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cooperation that has been forced to function inside a pressurized
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metal machine moving around the planet at some extraordinary speeds.
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That kind of experience is not easy to rever and
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it's definitely not something you want to lose in a
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gap between programs, and we have to be honest the gap.
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The gap is a real fear if the ISS is
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retired before the next generation of stations is truly operational.
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In the United States, rest losing continuity and low Earth
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orbit at exactly the wrong moment when the Chinese are
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starting to excel at it. It's not just about science anymore.
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Orbit has become infrastructure. It is now strategic, political, commercial,
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and dare add increasingly crowded. A permanent human presence overhead
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is no longer just a prestige project. It is part
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of how major powers prove that they belong to the future,
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which is which is why this debate feels bigger than
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just one station. Yes, the ISS is old, but old
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doesn't mean useless, present company myself excluded from that. In fact,
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in space flight, old often means it's been tested, it's
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been put through the wringer, we know how to fix it.
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It also means understood. It means you know we can
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operate it, we can trust it. And that may not
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be as glamorous as the next shiny artist render or concept,
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but it counts for a lot when the alternative comes
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with a heavy dose of uncertainty. But from that glorious
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old station circling overhead, let's come back down the terra
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firm a little bit, head down to the Texas coast,
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shall we for the biggest rocket in the world is
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preparing to try to become something more than just a spectacle,
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because down at star Base, the future is once again
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being welded together in full public view. Space X says
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it is only weeks away from launching the newest and
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most powerful version of Starship, version three, and the giant
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vehicle that has somehow managed to feel both inevitable and
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wildly unfinished, may take flight. And the next version is
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meant to be taller, stronger, and closer to the machine
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space X keeps promising will one day carry serious cargo,
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serious missions, and maybe eventually serious human dreams beyond the
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threshold of Earth. And that's probably why this is fascinating
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to watch. It's not simply because another big rocket is
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getting ready to fly, though that is awesome, but because
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Starship is trying to cross. It's trying to cross a strange,
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invisible line. I don't know how else to put that
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kind of between prototype and actual systems. Now, anyone that
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follows China, well, no, plenty of rockets can be dramatic,
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there are plenty of tests that can go viral, But
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becoming infrastructure is a different thing Entirely. Infrastructure is not
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built on one thunderous launch and a shower of dust.
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It's built on repetition, on reliability, and on the slow
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and sometimes very ugly process of making the extraordinary start
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to feel routine. And let's face it, Starship is not
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routine yet. It is still the giant creature in the surf,
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still half beast and half blueprint, still to some scale,
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carrying more ambition than actual proof. Every time it rises
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over the Gulf, it feels like a dare thrown at physics,
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and every time it fails, the world is reminded that
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scale does not care about charisma. But every time space
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X rebuilds, it retests and rolls another version onto the bad,
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the company's making the same argument all over again, that giant,
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fully reusable rockets are not just some whim or fantasy.
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It's just unfinished engineering. And that is a deeper pulse
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under this story. In my mind, Starship is no longer
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just trying to impress people. It's trying to mature, trying
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to get its driver's license. It is trying to become
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something NASA can lean on for Artemis, something space X
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can point toward Mars, and something the broader space world
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can no longer dismiss as a beautiful stainless steel for
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your or dream. So yes, the promise is enormous. It
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is a burden. A rocket has to be a moonlander,
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a cargo hauler, a Mars transport in the backbone of
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a new launch economy that does not get too merely
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just look impressive. It has to survive contact with reality.
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So we asked, we will watch this next launch, and
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it will carry a different kind of tension, not the
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old question of whether Starship can make noise and fire.
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We know it can do both quite well. The real
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question is whether this new version begins to feel like
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progress with any real rhythm, whether the machine is learning,
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whether the chaos could be narrowing, and whether the future
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SpaceX keeps selling is finally starting to look less like
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a trailer and more like the opening scene of the
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real thing. And if it works once again, even partly,
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then the meaning of Starship changes again. It becomes a
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little less mythical, a little less absurd, and they're a
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little more dangerous, but in the best possible way. Dangerous
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to old assumptions about how often we can fly, about
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how much we can lift, and how far away deep
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space really is or isn't, because once a machine this
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large begins to improve one purpose, and not just in theory,
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the horizon to it all moves. Now that does lead
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us into the next story, because of course it does.
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And now assholes in space.
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Chinese as Ho, Chinese as Ho, Chinese as Ho.
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So China is now looking at the Remee but A.
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I don't care how you say it. I just like
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saying Remy but A on the Moon's near side as
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a possible landing region for its first astronauts, and the
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site is being described as a kind of geological museum.
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That is the polite, scientific version, the less polite version,
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as China is not just staring lovingly at moon rocks
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for the beauty of the thing. China is doing what
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major powers do when they smell leverage, prestige, and future advantage.
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It is a picking ground, and that is why what
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they're doing matters. A landing site is never just a
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landing site. It comes with a declaration. It is a
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flag planet first in the planting room, long before it
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ever reaches the dust. Once a nation starts narrowing in
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on a specific region, the dream has moved out of
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the brochure stage. It has now entered logistics. It becomes mapping,
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it becomes intent with coordinates. Now, to be fair, Remeboda
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really does sound scientifically interesting. The geological museum is not.
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It's not a sort of a phrase people use on
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some random patch of dead gray rubble. It suggests a
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place where the Moon's history is laid out in layers,
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fractures and ancient features that are worth studying. Fine, great, wonderful.
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Science is good. We like science. But let us not
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pretend the Chinese state is wondering moon were with like
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a harmless professor with a rock hammer and a notebook.
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This is about power, visibility, and arriving early enough to
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shape the rules before somebody else does. Looking at US
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America and let's face it, the Moon, the Moon is changing.
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It is no longer just the old Apollo destination, parked
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in memory and dripping with nostalgia. It has become strategic again,
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or for the first time, depending on your point of view,
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useful again, political again. The conversation now is not merely
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who can get there, but who can stay, who can build,
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who can operate, and who gets to act like the
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place was always theirs in the first place, and let's
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face it, China understands that all too well. This is
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why we need to sit up a little bit straighter
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and take notice. Yes, this is a fun segment. What
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we call China is asshole, but there's behind the humor
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to it, there is a real threat. China has been
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very good at making big ambitions start to feel patient, steady,
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and bound to happen. It's no constant carnival barking to
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try to get your attention, no endless shouting. It's been
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a long march of capability, step by step, with some
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missteps here and there, until one day everyone looks up
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and realizes the thing that sounded distant is all of
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a sudden, very real. How many people realize they're like
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00:21:49.160 --> 00:21:52.519
on their fifth crew turnaround for their own space station.
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Most people probably still think it was only last year
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they put that thing in, but they're actually on their
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fifth six month crew rotation. They do have that station
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in norbit, with more astronauts, more operations, and more plants coming,
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and now with a possible human landing site on the
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Moon with a name attached to it. This isn't just
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dust in the wind. It's not nothing so whenever you
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hear remee buttoh, even though that's incorrect, when you hear
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the actual r I m ae bode i, just like
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00:22:29.319 --> 00:22:32.359
pronouncing it like a you know, certain Marvel character's name.
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You shouldn't hear only a scientific target. You should hear
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a marker in the larger contest. Hear the sound of
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another power choosing its place in the next lunar chapter.
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Hear the slow, methodical movement of a government that would
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very much like to be treated as inevitable in space
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the same way it wants to be treated and everything
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else it does. China is not asking permission to be
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part of the New Moon Age. China is acting like
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a nation that it tends to arrive, work and claim relevance,
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whether anyone is comfortable with it or not, and they
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don't care how they do it. Now, this doesn't mean
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00:23:17.240 --> 00:23:22.519
that panic is or isn't useful, and it doesn't. What
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00:23:22.559 --> 00:23:30.799
it does mean is complacency. It is it's stupid. So
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00:23:30.880 --> 00:23:33.279
while this area may be a geological museum, it also
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00:23:33.359 --> 00:23:35.240
is something else. Now. It is a reminder that the
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moon is not ours anymore, and we have to start
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acting like it now. Thankfully, we do have the US
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Space Force. Think of it what you will, But they
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did just move a GPS launch to space x Falcon
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due to Vulcan rocket glitch. Because once again, sometimes the
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future it can come in with a whimper, and sometimes
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it can come in with the war. Sometimes it arrives
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00:24:12.240 --> 00:24:15.799
with a memo as schedule change and somebody muttering under
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their breath in a control room that you hope one
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day gets aired live. So, yes, the US Space Force
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00:24:23.640 --> 00:24:26.640
has moved a GPS mission over to SpaceX Falcon nine
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because Vulcan nine or Vulcan hitty glitch. Now, to some
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this may sound like a small bureaucratic shuffle until until
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you actually stop and give it real fault. GPS is
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not some side project. It is part of the invisible
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machinery of modern life, especially for say the United States
357
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Space Force, Phones, aircraft, shipping, timing networks, military systems, financial logistics,
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emergency response. All of it leans in one way or
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another on satellites that most people never give a second
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thought or even at first thought about, unless the loose
361
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signal in a parking garage and start to yell obscenities
362
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all over the place. So when a launch tied to
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00:25:08.279 --> 00:25:12.880
a network or the US Space Force gets moved. The
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00:25:12.920 --> 00:25:15.039
story of the story is not merely about moving one
365
00:25:15.119 --> 00:25:18.079
rocket getting the nod over another. It's about trust, readiness,
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and well who gets the call when something important, absolutely
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positively has to be there and right now, whether people
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want to admit it or not. More often than not,
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00:25:31.119 --> 00:25:35.680
that's call seems to end up with, Hey, elon, can
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00:25:35.720 --> 00:25:36.480
you help.
371
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So?
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SpaceX has become the default answer when timing matters and
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payloads cannot afford to sit around waiting for someone else
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00:25:45.960 --> 00:25:49.400
to get their shit together. Now, this does not mean
375
00:25:49.599 --> 00:25:54.519
Falcon nine is magic. It means the cadence and reliability
376
00:25:54.599 --> 00:25:59.319
matters being able to launch again and again and again
377
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with a machine people fully understand it just matters more,
378
00:26:09.079 --> 00:26:12.720
and we are reminded sometimes little lessons can be hidden
379
00:26:13.319 --> 00:26:20.079
in stories like this, as two stories ago. There is
380
00:26:20.119 --> 00:26:23.759
a bit of romance around a new rocket, the newest system,
381
00:26:24.559 --> 00:26:30.039
the next great platform, But when national infrastructure is on
382
00:26:30.119 --> 00:26:35.240
the line, romance gets thrown out the window to basically
383
00:26:35.279 --> 00:26:37.759
whoever can actually roll to the pad, fuel the vehicle,
384
00:26:37.759 --> 00:26:41.680
and get the payload where it needs to go. It's
385
00:26:41.720 --> 00:26:47.599
not glamorous, it's just the truth of it. And the
386
00:26:47.640 --> 00:26:49.400
truth has a way of handing the crown to the
387
00:26:49.400 --> 00:26:56.240
provider that can deliver today and not ugh, maybe someday.
388
00:26:56.839 --> 00:27:00.519
And there's also something almost funny in this cons We
389
00:27:00.559 --> 00:27:02.680
live in an age that loves to talk about Mars cities,
390
00:27:02.759 --> 00:27:06.799
lunar bases, giant reusable ships leaping across the Solar System.
391
00:27:08.319 --> 00:27:11.759
Yet here down in engine rooms of actual space operations,
392
00:27:12.559 --> 00:27:16.440
the story is still wonderfully a bit old fashioned. One
393
00:27:16.519 --> 00:27:18.359
rocket had a problem, so the mission got moved to
394
00:27:18.400 --> 00:27:23.039
the truck that starts every morning. No fanfare, no poetry
395
00:27:23.079 --> 00:27:26.119
from the procurement office, just a cold logic of needing
396
00:27:26.119 --> 00:27:27.920
that job done in that truck sitting out there and
397
00:27:28.480 --> 00:27:33.720
ready to go. So yes, on the surface, this is
398
00:27:33.759 --> 00:27:36.960
simply a GPS launch moving from Vulkan to Falcon nine
399
00:27:36.960 --> 00:27:40.160
after a glitch. But underneath that smallest change is a
400
00:27:40.240 --> 00:27:42.480
much larger truth that we have to remember about the
401
00:27:42.480 --> 00:27:46.920
era we are living in. Space is not a spectacle.
402
00:27:47.000 --> 00:27:51.160
It can absolutely be, but it shouldn't be treated like
403
00:27:51.200 --> 00:27:56.279
it is all the time. It really has become logistics
404
00:27:57.119 --> 00:28:03.279
and infrastructure capability measure, not only by some grand vision,
405
00:28:03.359 --> 00:28:05.519
but who can be counted on when the clock is
406
00:28:05.599 --> 00:28:09.359
running and the Payluke cannot wait and time and time again,
407
00:28:10.039 --> 00:28:14.599
that answer seems to be steering toward a falcon. Though
408
00:28:15.440 --> 00:28:18.079
we do have to applaud Morgan and whatever company she
409
00:28:18.160 --> 00:28:22.720
works with joking firefy Aerospace. They did have a successful
410
00:28:22.799 --> 00:28:26.319
launch and everything went amazingly beautiful with the launch and
411
00:28:26.480 --> 00:28:30.519
on screen. But before we drift into the stranger half
412
00:28:30.519 --> 00:28:32.000
of the night, we need to make one last stop.
413
00:28:32.000 --> 00:28:37.519
In the world of contracts. Rocket Lab has landed a
414
00:28:37.559 --> 00:28:41.079
one hundred and ninety million launch deal tied to hypersonic
415
00:28:41.119 --> 00:28:44.559
testing for the US military. And while that may not
416
00:28:44.720 --> 00:28:53.440
have the gravitas of a moonshot or that stainless steel
417
00:28:53.440 --> 00:28:59.000
swagger of starship, it is the kind of information that
418
00:28:59.039 --> 00:29:04.119
tells you where the modern space economy is actually moving,
419
00:29:05.519 --> 00:29:08.079
because not every important story is about planning flags or
420
00:29:08.119 --> 00:29:11.759
building the colonies. So are just about once again, who
421
00:29:11.839 --> 00:29:15.680
gets trusted to fly when speed, precision, and national security
422
00:29:16.599 --> 00:29:21.000
all starts sitting at the same table. So rocket Lap
423
00:29:21.000 --> 00:29:23.759
has spit ears building a repetition as one of the
424
00:29:23.799 --> 00:29:26.200
more nimble and disciplined players. They are actually making a
425
00:29:26.240 --> 00:29:29.079
great name for themselves. It is not trying to be
426
00:29:29.119 --> 00:29:32.319
the loudest company in a room. It is trying to
427
00:29:32.359 --> 00:29:36.799
be the one that shows up prepared, flies often, and
428
00:29:36.880 --> 00:29:39.160
keeps expanding in the markets that used to feel reserved
429
00:29:39.160 --> 00:29:44.519
for well. SpaceX in a contract like this suggests that maybe,
430
00:29:44.759 --> 00:29:50.279
just maybe that strategy is starting to work. And let's
431
00:29:50.319 --> 00:29:52.799
be real, hypersonic testing is not some tiny niche tucked
432
00:29:52.839 --> 00:29:56.039
away in a Pentagon filing cabinet. Hypersonics sit right at
433
00:29:56.039 --> 00:30:00.400
the uneasy intersection of aerospace ambition ends military earth urgency.
434
00:30:02.880 --> 00:30:07.680
These are systems meant to move at absurd extreme speeds
435
00:30:07.680 --> 00:30:11.160
through brutal conditions, with very little room for failure and
436
00:30:11.640 --> 00:30:15.880
less patience for delay. So when a company gets chosen
437
00:30:15.920 --> 00:30:19.359
to support this kind of work, it does actually say something.
438
00:30:24.920 --> 00:30:30.119
We still talk about rockets as at least the general republic,
439
00:30:30.160 --> 00:30:35.119
as if they're still mostly symbols, sometimes symbols of national pride,
440
00:30:35.119 --> 00:30:38.240
symbols of big dreams. You see the giant plumes over
441
00:30:38.279 --> 00:30:45.640
the horizon, and yes they are all of that. But
442
00:30:45.680 --> 00:30:48.640
more and more we're not shocked to see a UPS truck,
443
00:30:49.119 --> 00:30:54.839
a FedEx truck usps occasionally when we passed them on
444
00:30:54.960 --> 00:30:59.160
the on the road six seven times a day, when
445
00:30:59.200 --> 00:31:03.799
before me maybe saw it once Now we see Amazon
446
00:31:03.839 --> 00:31:10.240
trucks all over the place, and more and more rockets
447
00:31:10.279 --> 00:31:13.680
are becoming logistic platforms for governments, defense agencies, scientists, and
448
00:31:13.759 --> 00:31:18.640
private industry alike. They are part truck, part launcher, and
449
00:31:18.720 --> 00:31:22.200
part infrastructure, whether anyone wants to really admit it or not,
450
00:31:23.519 --> 00:31:25.680
which means the companies that win are not always the
451
00:31:25.680 --> 00:31:29.279
ones with well the biggest names attached to it, the
452
00:31:29.319 --> 00:31:34.079
flashiest designs. They are just the ones that somewhere along
453
00:31:34.079 --> 00:31:40.240
the way became dependable. And though I haven't talked about
454
00:31:40.240 --> 00:31:43.559
them as much on the show because there isn't anything flashy,
455
00:31:43.599 --> 00:31:45.960
and let's face the people like to turn into podcast,
456
00:31:46.000 --> 00:31:49.240
we're a little bit of flash. They have been moving
457
00:31:49.279 --> 00:31:52.839
in this direction for a while now. They took the
458
00:31:52.920 --> 00:31:56.960
time to build their name with small launches, small payloads,
459
00:31:57.799 --> 00:32:00.240
and the faster, more agile kind of mission pro file
460
00:32:00.319 --> 00:32:03.880
than the old giants were built around. But stories like
461
00:32:03.880 --> 00:32:08.759
this show something else that's smaller. Well, it no longer
462
00:32:08.799 --> 00:32:12.559
means less important. We live in a world where specialized
463
00:32:12.599 --> 00:32:19.680
missions actually matter. We're testing matters where rapid access matters
464
00:32:19.720 --> 00:32:22.759
more and more and more, and a nimble company can
465
00:32:22.759 --> 00:32:26.799
become strategically significant without ever pretending it is the only
466
00:32:26.920 --> 00:32:31.079
game in town. So this one hundred and ninety million
467
00:32:31.079 --> 00:32:34.079
dollars deal is more than a paycheck. It is a marker.
468
00:32:34.599 --> 00:32:38.039
It tells us in everyone. Rocket Lab is continuing the climb,
469
00:32:38.079 --> 00:32:42.440
continuing to diversify, and continuing to win work that places
470
00:32:42.480 --> 00:32:46.319
it closer to the hard center of modern aerospace rather
471
00:32:46.400 --> 00:32:50.119
than just the decorative edges. And then a time when
472
00:32:50.119 --> 00:32:52.400
the sky's filling up with more missions, more competition, and
473
00:32:52.440 --> 00:32:55.359
more strategic meaning. I have to say this kind of
474
00:32:56.359 --> 00:33:03.920
positioning matters. And with that, let's all take a five
475
00:33:03.960 --> 00:33:06.279
minute break, grab a drink, or take a couple of
476
00:33:06.279 --> 00:33:07.799
steps of the one you have next to you, give
477
00:33:07.799 --> 00:33:09.720
your a lady if you have one, a hug and kiss,
478
00:33:11.319 --> 00:33:15.920
make sure your kid's okay, and UH will be right back.
479
00:33:39.319 --> 00:34:30.199
No sign, no Scott, Supol, just miles of cool, one
480
00:34:30.480 --> 00:34:43.199
slow way, those old god losely.
481
00:34:44.079 --> 00:35:11.079
So I thought the friends was face you cute little boy,
482
00:35:11.920 --> 00:35:23.960
so broad against the boy a hand the plaga something.
483
00:35:23.679 --> 00:35:43.440
As as he's a stones stones you fellow the same way,
484
00:35:43.800 --> 00:35:44.920
still moving.
485
00:36:34.519 --> 00:36:38.480
You did not feel the cold, You did not need
486
00:36:38.679 --> 00:36:39.760
the lord.
487
00:36:45.239 --> 00:36:50.280
You found inside of me, still turning side.
488
00:36:55.880 --> 00:36:58.599
How was the loveliest, nice.
489
00:36:58.519 --> 00:37:36.880
Sastalisty you found the scene still moving. Also stay from me.
490
00:38:02.119 --> 00:38:03.360
And welcome back.
491
00:38:06.400 --> 00:38:06.440
Ugh.
492
00:38:07.639 --> 00:38:09.199
I was able to get half of my beer drunk,
493
00:38:09.199 --> 00:38:12.639
so I'm happy now. But as the stars return, as
494
00:38:12.679 --> 00:38:15.440
we come back, we leave behind the machinery of Earth,
495
00:38:16.440 --> 00:38:18.719
and we head out to the cold dark, where even
496
00:38:18.840 --> 00:38:22.840
asteroids are more alive than they have any real right
497
00:38:23.199 --> 00:38:28.639
to be. Far from speeches, contracts, launch pads and polish
498
00:38:28.760 --> 00:38:34.360
missions patches, the universe is still behaving like itself, which
499
00:38:34.480 --> 00:38:39.679
is to say, strangely, violently and well a flare for imagery.
500
00:38:39.719 --> 00:38:46.000
No public relations department on Earth could ever improve. NASA's
501
00:38:46.079 --> 00:38:48.960
Dark Mission, which first made headlines by deliberately slamming a
502
00:38:49.000 --> 00:38:52.920
spacecraft into an asteroid, is still giving us new reasons
503
00:38:53.000 --> 00:38:57.920
to stare, and one of the latest huh actually, I
504
00:38:57.920 --> 00:39:01.000
gotta say, has a beautiful little phrase attached to it,
505
00:39:02.159 --> 00:39:07.320
cosmic snowballs. That is what researchers are now seeing in
506
00:39:07.360 --> 00:39:12.039
the aftermath of that impact, Not just dust drifting lazily away,
507
00:39:14.159 --> 00:39:16.079
not just a clean scar on a silent rock, but
508
00:39:16.159 --> 00:39:19.599
material being tossed about in ways that suggest these small
509
00:39:19.639 --> 00:39:22.960
bodies are not inert. Little gravel heaps waiting passively for
510
00:39:23.039 --> 00:39:27.519
the end of time that they may and are well
511
00:39:27.679 --> 00:39:32.559
seemingly dynamic, that they're reactive. They are, in their own
512
00:39:32.679 --> 00:39:38.039
rough and ancient way expressive. Hit one hard enough and
513
00:39:38.159 --> 00:39:43.840
the system answers back, and there's there's something humbling about that.
514
00:39:44.000 --> 00:39:48.800
In a weird way. We tend to imagine asteroids as
515
00:39:48.880 --> 00:39:52.639
kind of leftovers, as debris is cosmic attic junk, left
516
00:39:52.679 --> 00:39:55.880
behind after the real work of planetic building was done with.
517
00:39:57.000 --> 00:39:58.719
But the more we study them, the less they feel
518
00:39:58.800 --> 00:40:02.000
like trash, and the more they feel records. They seem
519
00:40:02.039 --> 00:40:06.840
to have memories inside them, memory of collisions, memory of heat,
520
00:40:07.000 --> 00:40:10.360
memory of the early Solar system when everything was still raw,
521
00:40:11.000 --> 00:40:14.440
unfinished and colliding with everything else. In the frenziest game
522
00:40:14.519 --> 00:40:20.079
of pool you can imagine, and Dark, for all its
523
00:40:20.280 --> 00:40:25.159
practical purposes as a planetary defense mission, has done something
524
00:40:26.960 --> 00:40:30.519
kind of, kind of neat. It did not merely test
525
00:40:30.599 --> 00:40:34.320
whether humanity could nudge a dangerous object off course. It
526
00:40:34.400 --> 00:40:37.199
also revealed that when you strike one of these wandering stones,
527
00:40:37.920 --> 00:40:44.559
the response, well, it can be messy, surprising, and unexpectedly
528
00:40:45.480 --> 00:40:52.360
delicate and cosmic snowballs is such a lovely contradiction for
529
00:40:52.519 --> 00:40:55.280
snow suggests softness, silence, and maybe a little bit of drifting,
530
00:40:55.679 --> 00:40:58.800
as Mother Nature is currently doing outside my window. Few
531
00:40:58.880 --> 00:41:02.679
Mother Nature. But these are fragments born of impact, flowing
532
00:41:02.719 --> 00:41:09.519
through space by violence, glimmering out from a wound. Hopefully
533
00:41:09.599 --> 00:41:12.559
that image lingers because it tells us something about the universe.
534
00:41:12.639 --> 00:41:16.960
We do live in space for far too many times
535
00:41:17.199 --> 00:41:22.400
is often described as empty, and yes, in one sort
536
00:41:22.440 --> 00:41:28.920
of way, space is empty, But don't confuse empty with dead.
537
00:41:30.400 --> 00:41:33.639
It's not static. It is full of motion, consequence, and
538
00:41:33.760 --> 00:41:36.000
long change of calls and effect that keep unfolding even
539
00:41:36.039 --> 00:41:38.760
when no one is there to watch it. A small
540
00:41:38.760 --> 00:41:41.000
asteroid struck by a human machine becomes a cloud of
541
00:41:41.039 --> 00:41:44.320
ejected material. That cloud becomes new data. That data now
542
00:41:44.400 --> 00:41:47.239
becomes new understanding, and suddenly one little collision, carried up
543
00:41:47.280 --> 00:41:51.079
millions of miles from home, become part of the long
544
00:41:51.199 --> 00:41:57.559
human attempt to read the temperate of the Solar System. Now,
545
00:41:58.159 --> 00:42:01.000
that's all lovely and almost painting a brush as well
546
00:42:01.000 --> 00:42:04.199
as already does. But there is a practical side of
547
00:42:04.280 --> 00:42:07.440
this as well. If we are ever going to defend
548
00:42:07.480 --> 00:42:10.760
Earth from a truly dangerous asteroid, we need to know
549
00:42:10.920 --> 00:42:14.039
not just whether we can hit one, but how how
550
00:42:14.119 --> 00:42:18.639
these bodies behave when they are hit? Are they solid, loose, cooperative, fragile?
551
00:42:18.679 --> 00:42:20.760
Do they absorb force? Do they shet it? Do they
552
00:42:20.800 --> 00:42:23.559
come apart in predictable ways? Or do they answer like
553
00:42:23.679 --> 00:42:28.920
a bag of a rubble wrapped around the secret? Those
554
00:42:28.960 --> 00:42:32.000
are not academic questions. If one day the object in
555
00:42:32.079 --> 00:42:34.239
our sites is not a test target but a threat
556
00:42:34.679 --> 00:42:40.159
with our planet's name already written in the math. But
557
00:42:40.280 --> 00:42:43.800
even outside that urgency, there is wonder here because in
558
00:42:43.960 --> 00:42:49.159
that phrase cosmic snowballs, the universe briefly becomes legible to
559
00:42:49.280 --> 00:42:52.920
the heart as well it is to the mind. You
560
00:42:53.000 --> 00:42:57.519
can picture in your brain cosmic snowballs, tiny bright fragments
561
00:42:57.519 --> 00:43:00.559
springing through the black like winters shake loose from a
562
00:43:00.599 --> 00:43:05.119
stone a snowfall. No wind will ever touch a glittering
563
00:43:05.239 --> 00:43:10.280
aftermass suspended in the oldest silence. We know, so somewhere
564
00:43:10.320 --> 00:43:12.880
out there, in the long dark between worlds, fragments are
565
00:43:12.880 --> 00:43:17.719
still flying from human made strike, right as frost and sunlight,
566
00:43:17.800 --> 00:43:20.440
telling us that even the smallest bodies in the Solar
567
00:43:20.480 --> 00:43:24.599
System have stories to give up. If we take the
568
00:43:24.719 --> 00:43:35.159
time to ask. Now, there is something beautifully backward. About
569
00:43:35.199 --> 00:43:39.000
this next story. If you want to look further into
570
00:43:39.079 --> 00:43:41.840
the universe, you would think the answer would be height,
571
00:43:42.119 --> 00:43:46.239
a mountaintop, a satellite, a great silver eye turned up
572
00:43:46.280 --> 00:43:53.239
for some remote and frozen place. But sometimes the best
573
00:43:53.280 --> 00:43:57.599
way to hear the oldest whispers in existence is not
574
00:43:57.760 --> 00:44:01.679
the climb. It's actually to go down, deep down, beneath rock,
575
00:44:01.800 --> 00:44:07.719
beneath weather, beneath the noise of the living world. Yes,
576
00:44:09.880 --> 00:44:12.840
a second story on China, because in China, f our
577
00:44:12.960 --> 00:44:15.639
underground scientists are preparing a detector that one may one
578
00:44:15.719 --> 00:44:22.039
day catch something extraordinary neutrinos from stars that died before
579
00:44:22.079 --> 00:44:29.760
the Earth ever existed. Okay, what does this mean? Well,
580
00:44:30.119 --> 00:44:32.440
it speaks to just how strange the act of observation
581
00:44:32.559 --> 00:44:35.679
can become when things you are chasing are nearly massless,
582
00:44:35.760 --> 00:44:40.280
nearly invisible, and moving through existence as if matter. Well,
583
00:44:41.079 --> 00:44:48.000
it's just a polite suggestion, not an actual thing. Neutrinos
584
00:44:48.079 --> 00:44:52.000
are among the quiet travelers in the known cosmos. Now
585
00:44:52.039 --> 00:44:55.159
they are born in violent places, nuclear reactions, stellar collapse,
586
00:44:55.519 --> 00:45:00.239
furnaces of the sun, death roes of massive stars, and
587
00:45:00.320 --> 00:45:05.320
then they flee, streaming outward in unimaginable numbers. Most of
588
00:45:05.360 --> 00:45:08.960
them pass through everything, through dust, through planets, through your body,
589
00:45:09.039 --> 00:45:13.400
through mine, through the whole earth, as if it were
590
00:45:13.440 --> 00:45:16.920
barely there. Trillions of them do it every second, and
591
00:45:17.000 --> 00:45:20.199
almost none of them so much as even stop to
592
00:45:20.280 --> 00:45:25.119
ask how you're doing. And that is why these detectors
593
00:45:25.239 --> 00:45:28.440
actually have to be hidden underground, not to get closer
594
00:45:28.480 --> 00:45:31.800
to the signal, but to get away from everything else.
595
00:45:33.360 --> 00:45:35.519
The deeper you go, the more the earth itself becomes
596
00:45:35.559 --> 00:45:39.719
a shield, protecting the instrument from straight interferences, from the
597
00:45:39.840 --> 00:45:42.800
chatter of cosmic rays, from the constant static of a
598
00:45:42.920 --> 00:45:46.639
universe that is full of way too many things happening
599
00:45:46.719 --> 00:45:49.920
at once. Down there in the dark, the detector can
600
00:45:50.039 --> 00:45:52.920
just wait for one of the rare interactions that says
601
00:45:55.239 --> 00:46:03.360
something ancient just passed through here. It's not difficult to
602
00:46:03.440 --> 00:46:08.559
be moved by this, because it's not just astronomy in
603
00:46:08.639 --> 00:46:12.840
the ordinary sense. This is like archaeology without the ruins.
604
00:46:13.360 --> 00:46:17.559
It's like paleontology without bones. It is the search for
605
00:46:17.639 --> 00:46:20.320
evidence from a chapter of the cosmic history so old
606
00:46:20.400 --> 00:46:23.440
that even stars, those great burning monarchs of time, we're
607
00:46:23.480 --> 00:46:26.079
already dying before our little world had learned to spend
608
00:46:26.119 --> 00:46:30.880
beneath a living sky. But there's also something deeply human
609
00:46:31.000 --> 00:46:33.760
in this effort. We bury a machine in darkness that
610
00:46:33.840 --> 00:46:36.440
it can catch the faintest traces of a vanished fire.
611
00:46:37.360 --> 00:46:40.760
We sink beneath mountains to listen for the dead. We
612
00:46:40.840 --> 00:46:43.360
build cathedrals of silence in order to hear particles that
613
00:46:43.440 --> 00:46:47.760
do not want to be heard. And if we're being
614
00:46:47.840 --> 00:46:51.599
honest right now, from our understanding, there is no survival
615
00:46:51.639 --> 00:46:55.960
advantage in any of this. There's no immediate profit, no
616
00:46:56.119 --> 00:46:59.440
simple use can be garnered. It is the kind of
617
00:46:59.480 --> 00:47:01.760
project is species undertakes only after it has begun to
618
00:47:01.800 --> 00:47:03.960
realize that understanding is one of the few ways to
619
00:47:04.119 --> 00:47:08.320
answer the loneliness of being conscious in a universe this old.
620
00:47:14.559 --> 00:47:17.760
Because yes, this feels kind of like hauntings, not in
621
00:47:17.840 --> 00:47:20.800
the childish sense of rattling chains and pale figures in hallways,
622
00:47:21.440 --> 00:47:24.000
but in a bit of a deeper, grander sense, filled
623
00:47:24.039 --> 00:47:27.880
with remnants and traces, with the surviving breath of those
624
00:47:27.960 --> 00:47:32.559
things long gone, and who knows what else travels with them.
625
00:47:33.480 --> 00:47:36.880
So yes, somewhere beneath China and a chamber cut away
626
00:47:36.880 --> 00:47:39.079
from the sunlight and time, a detector waits in patient
627
00:47:39.159 --> 00:47:45.440
darkness for particles from dead stars older than Earth. And
628
00:47:45.519 --> 00:47:47.880
I hate saying it, but it's true. If this succeeds,
629
00:47:48.480 --> 00:47:52.599
China will have done something quite remarkable. They will have
630
00:47:52.719 --> 00:47:55.800
listened through stone for the ghost of ancient sons and
631
00:47:56.000 --> 00:48:05.639
actually heard an answer. And maybe, maybe, just maybe somewhere
632
00:48:07.360 --> 00:48:10.280
not from a star that has died. Maybe it never
633
00:48:10.400 --> 00:48:15.840
had a star of its own, because there are things
634
00:48:15.920 --> 00:48:19.320
in our universe week are still trying and struggling to understand,
635
00:48:19.400 --> 00:48:24.039
things such as a rogue planet. Rug planets are a
636
00:48:24.280 --> 00:48:28.039
world without his sun. It does not circle, a star,
637
00:48:28.199 --> 00:48:31.199
does not sit in a neat, familiar system with seasons
638
00:48:31.280 --> 00:48:33.840
in daylight and a warm center holding everything in place.
639
00:48:34.760 --> 00:48:38.000
It drifts. Maybe it was thrown out of its own
640
00:48:38.079 --> 00:48:41.159
system long ago. Maybe it formed all together on its own.
641
00:48:43.559 --> 00:48:46.360
Either way, it's moving through interstellar darkness, untethered, cold, and
642
00:48:46.800 --> 00:48:49.760
seemingly cut off of every condition we usually associate with
643
00:48:49.880 --> 00:48:53.960
any form of life. Now, at first glance, this would
644
00:48:54.000 --> 00:48:58.079
sound like the end of a conversation. No star means
645
00:48:58.159 --> 00:49:00.920
no sunlight. No sunlight means no warmth on the surface.
646
00:49:01.000 --> 00:49:05.119
No warmth means no oceans, no weather, no forest, no
647
00:49:05.320 --> 00:49:07.840
easy chemistry. Unfolding under a bright sky. He wrote, planet
648
00:49:07.920 --> 00:49:10.599
sounds like a well, it sounds less like a destination
649
00:49:10.719 --> 00:49:13.960
and more like a cosmic corpse, still moving but long
650
00:49:14.079 --> 00:49:20.639
past any hope of being called alive. But that may
651
00:49:20.719 --> 00:49:26.599
not be the whole picture. The question scientists are asking
652
00:49:26.719 --> 00:49:28.559
is not whether the surface of one of these worlds
653
00:49:28.920 --> 00:49:32.880
would be pleasant. It would not be. The question is
654
00:49:32.960 --> 00:49:36.880
whether moons orbiting such planets might still hold onto enough
655
00:49:37.039 --> 00:49:45.760
internal heat to keep water liquid beneath thick ice. Once
656
00:49:45.840 --> 00:49:52.920
liquid water enters any discussion, even in darkness, well the
657
00:49:53.000 --> 00:49:55.519
helm and the book are picked up, and that door
658
00:49:56.360 --> 00:49:59.480
may open a little bit. That's an inside joke for
659
00:49:59.480 --> 00:50:03.360
a handful. Now we already know our solar system gives
660
00:50:03.440 --> 00:50:06.440
us examples of this kind of possibility. Europa and Ensulatus
661
00:50:06.480 --> 00:50:10.039
are not warm places, yet they remain interesting because beneath
662
00:50:10.119 --> 00:50:14.760
their frozen exteriors there may be subsurface oceans kept active
663
00:50:14.840 --> 00:50:18.440
by internal heating. Gravity can squeeze the moon, flexing its interior,
664
00:50:18.519 --> 00:50:23.280
generating hate and radioactive decay can help. Of course, thick
665
00:50:23.360 --> 00:50:25.800
ice can act like insulation. Putting these things together in
666
00:50:25.840 --> 00:50:27.880
a moon that looks frozen and dead from the outside,
667
00:50:28.440 --> 00:50:35.679
oh could actually have an ocean inside of it. Now
668
00:50:36.039 --> 00:50:41.440
this is lost, wonder so from hidden oceans in a
669
00:50:41.960 --> 00:50:45.800
starless dark. We come to an older and perhaps stranger question,
670
00:50:47.039 --> 00:50:49.519
one thing that has been hanging over every telescope, antenna
671
00:50:49.519 --> 00:50:52.519
and hopeful little signal we have ever pointed into the
672
00:50:52.639 --> 00:50:59.000
night for a long long time. The question has usually
673
00:50:59.039 --> 00:51:06.360
been framed one way, Where all the white women at
674
00:51:08.239 --> 00:51:14.280
or paraphrase for the science community, where is everybody? The
675
00:51:14.400 --> 00:51:18.679
galaxy is old, the stars are many planets, well, they
676
00:51:18.719 --> 00:51:21.239
appear to be common. And if life is not some
677
00:51:21.360 --> 00:51:24.159
impossible accident happened only once in a small world and
678
00:51:24.239 --> 00:51:27.159
one rather nervous species, then the silence starts to feel
679
00:51:27.199 --> 00:51:32.639
almost theatrical. Yet we keep listening, and the sky keeps
680
00:51:32.639 --> 00:51:37.000
refusing the answer, and eventually somebody always says, maybe maybe
681
00:51:37.039 --> 00:51:42.559
there's nobody out there. Hmm. But that's not the only answer.
682
00:51:44.320 --> 00:51:49.440
Another possibility is far less comforting to most people's egos.
683
00:51:50.239 --> 00:51:51.960
It may not be that the universe is empty. It's
684
00:51:51.960 --> 00:51:56.239
that nobody's interested in speaking with Earthlings. The silence may
685
00:51:56.280 --> 00:51:57.920
not be the science of absence. It may be the
686
00:51:58.000 --> 00:52:04.199
silence of avoidance. Yes, now, before Earthlings get too offended,
687
00:52:04.760 --> 00:52:06.880
it is worth admitting that there is a certain logic
688
00:52:06.960 --> 00:52:11.639
to this idea. Look at us from a distance, we
689
00:52:11.800 --> 00:52:18.679
are clever, yes, curious, yes, capable of art, science, love, sacrifice, beauty,
690
00:52:20.280 --> 00:52:27.800
and astonishing acts of imagination. We are also loud, tribal, erratic,
691
00:52:28.800 --> 00:52:33.440
heavily armed, and not always especially mature. We are the
692
00:52:33.480 --> 00:52:35.800
sort of civilization that can split the atom map the
693
00:52:35.880 --> 00:52:39.239
cosmic microwave background, and then immediately use the same species
694
00:52:39.280 --> 00:52:41.280
wide brain power to screamine each other on the Internet
695
00:52:41.559 --> 00:52:47.280
over sandwiches and sports mascots. If an older intelligence were
696
00:52:47.360 --> 00:52:49.639
quietly surveying the galaxy, it may not look at Earth
697
00:52:49.719 --> 00:52:56.239
and think, yeah, this is an ideal first contact. So
698
00:52:56.400 --> 00:52:59.800
that possibility changes the emotional shape of the old alien question,
699
00:53:01.480 --> 00:53:08.320
because once you stop assuming science means emptiness, the whole
700
00:53:08.360 --> 00:53:13.840
thing becomes less lonely and more unnerving. The galaxy might
701
00:53:13.920 --> 00:53:19.239
be inhabited and still close to everyone. It might be
702
00:53:19.360 --> 00:53:23.920
full of watchers, cautious civilizations, or societies that long ago
703
00:53:24.199 --> 00:53:27.119
learned that announcing yourself to every unknown listener of dark
704
00:53:27.760 --> 00:53:31.199
is stupid. It might even be that intelligence does not
705
00:53:31.360 --> 00:53:38.079
naturally rush outward waving hello. Maybe they're introverts. Maybe it's
706
00:53:38.119 --> 00:53:44.920
because more time makes them more careful, more selective, more
707
00:53:44.960 --> 00:53:49.559
aware that not every stranger deserves your address, your mixtape,
708
00:53:49.639 --> 00:53:54.800
your nudes. And there is a bit of a hard
709
00:53:54.880 --> 00:53:59.400
lesson in that human beings often imagine contact to some
710
00:53:59.519 --> 00:54:04.920
sort of reward. We discover, radio, build observatories, point dishes
711
00:54:04.960 --> 00:54:07.719
into space, and quietly assume that if anyone is out there,
712
00:54:08.199 --> 00:54:12.760
they would naturally want to meet us. But that assumption
713
00:54:12.840 --> 00:54:15.559
says more about us than it does about them. We
714
00:54:15.639 --> 00:54:19.599
think curiosity should be answered because we asked the question,
715
00:54:19.719 --> 00:54:23.280
didn't we We keep forgetting that the universe is under
716
00:54:23.400 --> 00:54:27.760
no obligation to be flattered by our advances, our mixtape,
717
00:54:28.960 --> 00:54:36.320
our nudes. And yet the silence remains fascinating, precisely because
718
00:54:36.320 --> 00:54:47.920
it leaves room for so many possibilities and probabilities. But
719
00:54:48.039 --> 00:54:51.280
let's not forget too. For a long time, habitability was
720
00:54:51.400 --> 00:54:54.800
treated almost like some sort of real estate. You look
721
00:54:54.840 --> 00:54:56.960
for the right neighborhood, the right distance from the start,
722
00:54:57.039 --> 00:54:59.599
or the right temperature, maybe a little water, maybe a
723
00:54:59.639 --> 00:55:03.199
stable orbit, and if the cosmic zoning laws all line up,
724
00:55:03.639 --> 00:55:07.280
then perhaps life gets a chance. Oh yes, this model
725
00:55:07.320 --> 00:55:10.840
still matters, But the deeper astronomy actually goes. The most
726
00:55:10.920 --> 00:55:15.440
obvious answer becomes that the universe may actually not be
727
00:55:15.559 --> 00:55:17.800
as nearly as tidy as everyone would love it to be.
728
00:55:20.320 --> 00:55:23.840
We have to keep that in mind when we think
729
00:55:23.880 --> 00:55:28.800
about all of this. It may be one of the
730
00:55:28.840 --> 00:55:34.079
strangest comforts science has us available that the universe may
731
00:55:34.119 --> 00:55:37.679
be cold beyond measure, but it also could be full
732
00:55:38.519 --> 00:55:44.679
of billions and trillions of shelters, quiet pockets, buried seas,
733
00:55:44.760 --> 00:55:49.639
dark refuges where chemistry goes on patiently unseen. If that
734
00:55:49.760 --> 00:55:52.880
is true as in life, well, it may be out there,
735
00:55:54.159 --> 00:56:04.599
but we we're not mature enough yet. And now let's
736
00:56:04.679 --> 00:56:08.119
move on to the celestial watch, shall we? For the
737
00:56:08.159 --> 00:56:10.000
next two weeks, this guy give us one day worth
738
00:56:10.039 --> 00:56:13.960
circling an ink Wednesday, April first, when the full next
739
00:56:14.079 --> 00:56:17.559
moon arrives, and the common almanac tradition it is the
740
00:56:17.679 --> 00:56:23.280
pink moon, and the unition of bach season naming tradition,
741
00:56:23.440 --> 00:56:29.159
it is the bopugama geesus. I swear ep hates torturing
742
00:56:29.239 --> 00:56:33.599
me or likes torturing me. It's the broken snowshoe moon.
743
00:56:37.280 --> 00:56:39.840
That is your big silver flood. Late night, the moon
744
00:56:39.880 --> 00:56:41.800
will look full in the evenings and around it too,
745
00:56:42.599 --> 00:56:44.800
but April first is the peak. It is beautiful for
746
00:56:44.920 --> 00:56:49.239
moon gazing, great for moonlit landscapes, and hard on the
747
00:56:49.320 --> 00:56:52.360
faint stuff because once that much moonlight fills the sky,
748
00:56:53.039 --> 00:56:55.440
dim stars and deep sky targets get pushed back into
749
00:56:55.480 --> 00:56:58.760
the background. There is also one wild card in the
750
00:56:58.920 --> 00:57:02.880
mix Comma see twenty twenty six A one maps It
751
00:57:03.000 --> 00:57:05.639
makes its close passed by the Sun around April fourth,
752
00:57:05.679 --> 00:57:10.159
and if it survives it actually could brighten dramatically. But
753
00:57:10.320 --> 00:57:12.960
this is not a casual backyard comment to point at
754
00:57:13.039 --> 00:57:14.920
for the neighbors. It stays too close to the sun
755
00:57:15.000 --> 00:57:17.559
for safe normal viewing, so this will be one that
756
00:57:17.599 --> 00:57:20.960
you'll have to require astronomy sites and scientific sites to
757
00:57:21.599 --> 00:57:25.119
get the best images for, but stay stay alert for it.
758
00:57:27.159 --> 00:57:29.519
So that's it for tonight's transmission. Thank you for tuning
759
00:57:29.599 --> 00:57:33.119
in whenever, and however you do, please stay tuned for
760
00:57:33.239 --> 00:57:37.079
Alan Ray coming up next special Thanks to Nasaspace X
761
00:57:37.119 --> 00:57:40.400
based dot com, Arce Technica, Popular Mechanics, and everyone out
762
00:57:40.400 --> 00:57:44.199
there keeping humanity's eyes on the stars. With me at
763
00:57:44.239 --> 00:57:47.199
the helm, the EP plotting our next course, and the
764
00:57:47.239 --> 00:57:51.199
ship's computer in the back whispering star maps through the static.
765
00:57:51.320 --> 00:57:55.880
This has been the lost wonder of podcast until next orbit.
766
00:57:56.320 --> 00:57:59.360
I hope you enjoyed the show, learned a little something,
767
00:57:59.440 --> 00:58:02.719
and maybe had a lap or two as well,