Brian Cox, welcome.
>> Thank you.
>> It's particularly nice to have you in
the studio, not down the line somewhere.
Yeah. In a hotel room. Um, I just wanted
to start by talking about your uh
Australia and its skies because you're
here. Why is Australia a great place for
stargazers?
>> Well, part of it is the geometry of the
solar system. So, the southern
hemisphere points towards the galactic
center. So, the Milky Way is far richer.
If you come from the north, you're
dazzled by the Milky Way here because
Australia points towards the galactic
center. And you also have the two
satellite galaxies of the Milky Way, the
Melanic clouds, which um just dominate
the sky, beautiful things which you
can't see from the north. So in the
north, we're pointing outwards to the
outer sort of backwaters of our galaxy.
So you're very lucky here. So for
someone who's never gone out and looked
at the stars with any particular focus,
what is it that looking at the stars,
what does it do to you, to your mind?
>> Oh, it's it's it's always been um it's
the thing that got me into science in
the first place. Um so for some reason
when I was very young and I don't know
why I became fascinated by these points
of light in the sky and it's an example
of something that's common I think
throughout science which is the more you
know the more magical it becomes. So for
example now we know that I would say
pretty much every star you see in the
night sky has planets which we we now we
didn't know that when I was growing up
in the 1970s but we know it now. So you
your imagination can begin to wander
that they're all solar systems. Every
single one of them is a solar system.
Then you start thinking well you know
are the planets with oceans on them and
if there's oceans on the planets is
there life out there beyond beyond our
solar system beyond the earth and so on.
So I think it's um it's a it's a science
that you can do from your back garden as
you said and it's a science that allows
your imagination to wander.
>> So is that what it does? We understand a
little of what it did to you to put you
on the journey that you're on, but for
someone doing it for the first time, how
much does it change you to have that
sense of wonder in the sky?
>> I think it's it's a good question. I
think astronomy has always been in part
about our place in initially with our
place in creation. My my show starts
actually in around 1600 people like
Galileo and Kepler laying the
foundations of the modern science modern
science at the time cosmology was
Aristotle's cosmology that so the earth
is motionless at the center of a finite
universe nothing changes beyond the
orbit of the moon and this is 1600 and
within a few decades we have Newton's
law of universal gravitation and within
a few centuries we've discovered that
there are two trillion galaxies in the
observable universe
the universe 13.8 8 billion years since
the big bang. That raises questions
though to your to your question because
obviously then you immediately say what
is our place and I think astronomy and
cosmology are the two sciences that
really force you to ask that question.
What is the value of of of our
civilization? What is our place in that
vast universe? So what happens to that
question if you say that's 400 years
that we got from Galileo and his
telescope
to now to conceiving of the possibility
of of humans living on the moon even the
remoter notion of a colony on Mars if we
survive what's another 400 years going
to bring us
>> you know that that's also a very great
question because it it feeds so I would
say it will take us to the stars if we
carry on at this rate of progress just a
few centuries. We've already got two
spacecraft now in interstellar space
that we are communicating with primarily
actually through the deep space network
in Canberra. So that's pointing towards
those telescopes that those um
spacecraft. So in in 400 years of modern
science, we've gone beyond our solar
system. So you're right, we should be
voyaging to the stars in the next few
centuries if we survive. does raise an
interesting question that actually which
is why does nobody else appear to have
done that which is sometimes called the
Fermy paradox which I do discuss in the
show. It's one of the I I I think it's
one of the most puzzling observations we
have made that as far as we can tell
there isn't anybody else out there.
>> I I noticed that you said a friend of
yours, a biologist I think said don't
worry about it. It's just if there's
anything out there it's slime. Could he
could he be wrong?
Absolutely. I mean it could, you know,
we we systematically look for signs of
other civilizations. It's called SETI
and it's we use radio telescopes like
the parks telescope here in Australia
and we we listen and we look for
signals. So the reason we do that is
because we would not be surprised if we
saw something tomorrow. But it's
actually you said don't wor it's
interesting you said don't worry it's
all slime. I would worry if if
everything
>> if we are alone. Well, yeah, because
then in in some sense I would say that
we have the responsibility to um allow
meaning to persist in a galaxy of 400
billion suns. We're the only intelligent
civilization of weight on our shoulders.
>> Yes, indeed. So, I actually personally
would perhaps be more relaxed about
events here on Earth if there was
somebody else carrying the torch as
well.
>> The the show that you're doing here is
called Emergence. What is the emergence
of the title?
>> It starts with a story of Johannes
Kepler. So the idea that planets move in
ellipses around the sun. This is Kepler.
But um in 1610 he wrote a book called
the six cornered snowflake and it's
still available. I strongly recommend
it. It's a beautiful book. And he just
asked this question about snowflakes.
Why are they all six cornered? Why are
they all similar? Um and it's actually
extremely deep question um for for many
reasons. One is that you it's a 20th
century answer. It's to do with the
water molecule and quantum mechanics and
all these things we discovered in the
20th century. So he couldn't have
answered it. But one of the most
important things is that at the end of
the book he says I don't know the
answer. He he writes, you know, I leave
it to to you to it's actually to his
benefactor this who he wrote the book
to, but also to future generations to to
to find out. And if you think about
progress, I' i've seen it written that
progress was invented pretty much around
that time. You real progress starts. We
talked about 400 years after that we're,
you know, flying to the stars.
>> But for progress, you need to accept
there are things you don't know. Is that
why you describe certainty as something
brutish? I yeah I say yeah the at the
end of the show actually I say that um
we we that we live in a world where the
silence necessary for progress is
drowned out by the vulgar noise of
certainty and it's it is it's a it's a
noise if you see so if you think about
it if if you think you know everything
you cannot make progress and the idea
that that was radical only a few
centuries ago is is really central to
the show I say right at the start and
we're going to focus on a lot of things
that we don't know because that's where
the excitement is and that's where
that's the reason the future will be
better than the past is because we
accept that there are things yet to be
known.
>> At the same time I I I see that you tend
optimistic in the way you think about
the future and progress. But at the same
time there's an enormous amount of
exploration going on around the moon
around possibilities of of
exploitation of the moon and indeed the
universe. How much damage could we do
with satellites and radio waves?
>> I I don't think that's the the way to
think about it. So because the so the
space economy is one of the fastest
growing areas of the global economy.
Indeed, many economists I speak to say
don't don't talk of the space economy
and the it's just the economy. You think
about the GPS system, for example. It's
it's central to the way that we live our
lives. Um I think the number in the UK
is I think it's 18%
16 or 18% of UK GDP is relies on
space-based infrastructure and that's
including things such as financial
transactions that take the timing
information from space and so on. So it
tells us that already our economies the
global economy and our national
economies are reliant on that
infrastructure. And so the more we
expand that infrastructure then really
what you're talking about is growing the
economy.
>> So so we we should learn to trust people
like in a way learn to trust Jeff Bezos
and Elon Musk. Obviously people have all
these doubts and anxieties about what
they're doing along with the the
brilliance that attends a lot of the the
engineering
achievements. Should we trust them a bit
more? The reason that we have
international bodies like the the UN and
intergovernmental organizations that are
working on that framework is of course
that we don't just trust industry or you
know this is not a judgment on industry
being moral or otherwise industries are
industries but we do have frameworks
that that obviously regulate how
industries operate in our countries and
internationally and we need to make sure
the right frameworks are there because
it's becoming as I said it's it's some
like something like approaching ing a
fifth of the UK economy reliant on that
infrastructure, then you begin to
understand that there needs to be some
it's just like it's no different to the
the the rules and regulations that
govern international air travel or or or
travel on the oceans. We understand that
that's necessary. In fact, in some ways
to you call me an optimist. So the
optimistic take on it is that we are
forced to collaborate and to operate as
a world when we start to try to
understand how we navigate the
challenges of space. It makes no sense
does it if you think about the
international space station for example.
>> You think well it's in it's in
Australian airspace if it goes I don't
know how often it goes over Australia
but but it's in your airspace as a
country for a few minutes. So it makes
no sense to but I I take that as very
positive because it forces collaboration
on us.
>> Brian Cox, thank you very much indeed
for talking to us.
>> Thank you.