"I Blame Pink Floyd For This" Neil deGrasse Tyson on Pink Floyd's Album Title 'The Dark Side Of The Moon' | Meet Your Nominee - video Dailymotion

Emmy Nominee Neil deGrasse Tyson on spending decades explaining the science behind Pink Floyd's 1973 album 'Dark Side of The Moon'

Transcript

00:00I blame Pink Floyd for this.

00:03In 1973, their album, yeah, I know, that requires an explanation.

00:08In 1973, I don't blame them for the flat earth, I blame them for this other thing I'm about to tell you.

00:12Okay.

00:131973, their big hit album, what's the name of it?

00:18Dark Side of the Moon.

00:19The Dark Side of the Moon.

00:21There is no Dark Side of the Moon.

00:24There's a far side, and there's a near side, because the moon orbits in a way,

00:30that it keeps the backside away from the earth.

00:32Okay, it's called being tidally locked.

00:34Very natural state for things in the universe, by the way, as weird as it may otherwise sound.

00:38There's a far side, and there's a near side, but all sides of the moon receive sunlight across the month.

00:45So the fact that Pink Floyd had an album with that title meant I spent decades having to undo people's, as an educator.

00:54So if I had a time machine, I'd go back and change the title of that to The Far Side of the Moon,

01:00and that would, I would restore thousands of hours of my life back.

01:06So, now if you listen to the song, the title song on the album, The Dark Side of the Moon,

01:14at the very end, it fades off, at the very end it says,

01:17there is no Dark Side of the Moon.

01:21So I said, okay, maybe that's the, maybe that's, maybe, all right, so, all right.

01:25But then it continues to say, it's all dark.

01:29I said, oh, all right.

01:30Oh, no.

01:31Now I have to explain.

01:33Why not?

01:34Right, so my.

01:34Why there's light on the moon.

01:35So, so, the, so, I guess my point is the, pop culture has, is such a force in the world

01:52that it's very hard to undo something that people are misthinking if it is embedded in pop culture.

01:59Pop culture, music, movies, you know, and so one needs to stay vigilant to maintain a sound foundation

02:13of what you will then think next.

02:16And I'm a fan of Mark Twain's edict, which I think should be mantra for the artist.

02:23First, get your facts straight, then distort them at your leisure.

02:27That's lovely.

02:30And, yeah, if you don't know that there's, the whole moon gets light, you don't even know

02:34how to make a next creative thought.

02:36Right.

02:36Based on that.