Things You Thought You Knew - Venus Pizza, Wavelengths, and Horsepower

How long would it take to cook a pizza outside on Venus? On this episode, Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck Nice discuss the physics of surface temperature, the size of ~wAvEs~, and the meaning of horsepower. How many horses would you need to get to space?
What is temperature in the world of physics? We explore the temperature of light and how thermometers sense heat. How can you tell the temperature if you don’t have any particles? How long would it take to cook a pizza on a windowsill on Venus? We calculate just how long it would take and what sort of factors you need to take into account while making the perfect Venusian pizza pie. How does what you’re wearing impact your temperature? We talk about light absorption, the hottest parts of Earth's atmosphere, and what’s going on in the ozone layer.
What are the wavelength sizes on the electromagnetic spectrum? What’s a wavicle? Find out about wave-particle duality and how the human body detects different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum. Can our bodies sense more than just visible light? Discover microwaves and radio waves. How do we pick up on these types of waves? How do antennae work? We discuss the holes in your kitchen microwave and how electron microscopes work. How can we see something smaller than visible light?
We hop in our horseless carriages and take a ride down what it means for something to have horsepower. What is the power of one horse? We break down engines and the different metrics used to measure their power. What about watts? How much horsepower does a NASA shuttle rocket engine have? What would it take to get millions of horses to run fast enough to get into orbit? We discuss how the power of atomic bombs and hydrogen bombs are quantified. Exploding horses? Death stars? All that and more, on another Things You Thought You Knew edition of StarTalk!
Thanks to our Patrons Kyle W Odren, Frank Kotarski, John Pologruto, Corina Szabo, Shera, Bogdan Pop, Corey McKinney, Matthew Lichtenstein, and Richie Damiani for supporting us this week.
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About StarTalk:
Science meets pop culture on StarTalk! Astrophysicist & Hayden Planetarium director Neil deGrasse Tyson, his comic co-hosts, guest celebrities & scientists discuss astronomy, physics, and everything else about life in the universe. Keep Looking Up!
#StarTalk #NeildeGrasseTyson
0:00 - Introduction
2:03 - Physics Of Temperature
4:20 - Cooking Pizza On Venus
8:10 - How To Dress For Hot Weather
11:04 - Rules For Measuring Temperature
12:32 - Hottest Part Of Earth’s Atmosphere
14:33 - Temperature Of Ozone Layer
16:06 - Wave-Particle Duality
17:10 - Different Wavelengths Of Light
27:30 - The Smallest Wavelengths
29:15 - The Anomaly On Chuck’s Forehead
30:10 - How Scientific Understanding Shapes Language
33:30 - What Is A Horsepower?
38:03 - Units To Measure Atomic Bombs
42:05 - Scientific Accuracy Of Star Wars
43:51 - Closing Notes

[@seanbabi]

Let’s face it. Neil is the main man in these videos, obviously. But when Chuck get introduced at the start of an episode you can’t help but be like “yesss!!”

[@idioticfun1901]

chuck brings life to the science unlike any other

[@sneezymango8183]

My thoughts exactly! :)

[@Carlosmahumane]

👍

[@katicabogar24]

I’m checking episode descriptions before pressing play 🤣

[@MonikaBardell]

Chuck is funny 😂

[@Jager-er4vc]

The amount that Chuck adds to the understanding is huge. He’s funny and lighthearted. But he really does help bring the information home

[@MaikolNox]

I hope this show never ends so much useful information being dumped here for future generations

[@StarTalk]

So do we!

[@MaikolNox]

@@StarTalk I love what you do, Neil!!

[@charlesmasoncarr7831]

0p

[@easymoneysniper9013]

Shows like this will keep our Ai overlords from killing us

[@realtjbrand]

Chuck is so funny 😭 I love you Dr. Tyson but this show would not be the same without him. Thanks for always sharing your knowledge with us 🙏 enjoyed the vid.

[@thirstfast1025]

"But what happens if you have no particles?" "... ... You need tea." That's why you're Chuck *Nice.* You're awesome, Chuck!

[@williamyoung9401]

OMG, so hilarious! (10:00) LOL!

[@tylersmith4384]

I absolutely love StarTalk! It’s my daily go to for my entertainment and my escape. Even with limited time working 40-60 hours a week and with a toddler running around. I’m 23 and have followed Dr. Tyson since I saw him cameo on “The Universe” 12 years ago. WE NEED MORE COSMOS.

[@eddieolsson5449]

Dynamite isn't TNT.

[@ThinkTankMC]

It's because of Neil, Bill Nye, and Carl Sagan that make me want to be a public educator and make my own "Explaining" videos. Keep it up you guys!

[@StarTalk]

It’s a great thing to be. Keep reaching for the stars!

[@lbthingsstuffmore9513]

And you are SURELY NEEDED!💚💚💚

[@gxlorp]

Can we get Chuck an honorary doctorate. I want to see an episode of him introduced that way. Thanks in advance

[@lemongavine]

He seems pretty smart and definitely eager to learn

[@d.charlespyle]

Minor point: TNT is Trinitrotoluene. Dynamite was made with nitroglycerine soaked into diatomaceous earth or other filler.

[@stillwatersas]

kieselguhr

[@d.charlespyle]

@@stillwatersas That is one of its names more commonly used. In the US, I used to have a bottle of the stuff, and it was labeled "Diatomaceous earth."

[@murasaki848]

Many cooks swear by putting unglazed quarry tiles in the oven as a sort of "thermal inertia" similar to the way Neil described a pizza oven. Make sure they are unglazed, as the chemicals used to glaze tiles can be quite toxic. We're always going to have old symbols as a reference like "horsepower" and "kiloton". Notice the call function on that little supercomputer you have in your pocket is labeled with an old fashioned telephone handset, and the alarm on that same device still has an icon that looks like an old brass alarm clock. In simplifying the antenna explanation, Neil was a bit inaccurate. Most simple antennas are 1/4 or 1/2 the wavelength of the frequency desired. This is why your car antenna isn't 10 feet long to pick up FM radio stations (100 MHz = 3 meters). Notice that even this is overly simplified since we've had pocket sized radios since 1957. Antenna design gets real complicated real quick.

[@jaylenharris9560]

neil has such a warm and comforting laugh 😂

[@YAMAHA_FAN.]

So true, he laugh from bottom of his heart ❤

[@StarTalk]

That’s the truth!

[@stephanienirenberg7426]

Love you guys. I get so excited when I see a new Star Talk.

[@terriemartinez9989]

Me too!🌟😎

[@Cosmicphalus]

Me too

[@StarTalk]

We’re glad! Be excited that we’re releasing a new one today!

[@Cosmicphalus]

@@StarTalk can you all touch on the time travel in Marvel’s Avengers: Endgame? And what if we harness lightning and magnets 🧲 gravity to prop open wormholes?

[@rolandorzabal1955]

Same here ☺️

[@tmrogers87]

Thermodynamically fluent is a great compliment, nice job Chuck!

[@jacobokpara7618]

40mins video feels like 5mins. Great job guys. Love start talk. Been following for years now

[@LEDewey_MD]

Leave it to Chuck and Dr. Tyson to distill most of physics (thermodynamics, electromagnetism, relativity, optics, pyrotechnics, cooling with bike reflectors, culinary art) into one, single, 45 minute, completely captivating and educational episode!! Kudos!!

[@gxlorp]

That's Dr. Chuck

[@aaronpincus6095]

My late father, an Aerospace engineer used to say, “You don’t know what you don’t know, until you know it.” Always keep learning.

[@Stoffe3D]

Please make the Star Wars science episode! Would be so fun! I also like how R2D2 can move in the sand with its small wheels on the legs! :-)

[@molochsorcery4357]

Funny thing is Samantha Carter used a stargate to blow up a sun to destroy Apophis' fleet on Stargate SG:1 and THAT was satisfying to watch. I always wondered how the Goa'uld Anubis would fare agains Darth Vader in a battle. His half-ascended powers against Vader's Dark Force.

[@davidjames8505]

It's been going on for quite a while but I'm glad I found Star Talk a few months ago. I've thoroughly enjoyed catching up and learning new things. Really love seeing the special quests with speciality in specific fields of science as well inform us of how things work.

[@ThePixelExpedition]

I got a pizza and automobile ad during the video. Well played KZbin... lol Great episode as always, Star Talk!

[@koud29]

A horsepower is defined as the power needed to raise 75kg 1 meter in one second. Now that is a proper unit for a NASA rocket if I ever saw one.

[@bitemacauk]

Yes PLEASE, do a "Star Wars is stoopid" episode! Maybe call it "Star Wars rights and wrongs" but i dont know what they got roght

[@TechNextLetsGo]

Michio Kaku did a show about that about a decade ago, Neil could go for one too.

[@GeorgePap99]

Okay, I think I remember watching these specific 3 topics being explained in 3 different videos, but no matter what, i still watched the whole video cause the moment I clicked on it and I realized it's a 45min.-long explainer I got really excited :P So please do more long explainers like this one, I've always wanting them more. Like how can you stop at 15minutes really? 😂

[@ojmatthew]

I've definitely seen these before. I remember Chuck joking about the bump/lipoma on his head. I recently got the same thing removed from my forehead.

[@katicabogar24]

The same podcast recording also has been published a while ago, the horsepower bit is one of my favourites

[@pesticidepiam]

Same !!!!!!!!!!

[@theprogamer9983]

Love your vids, keep up the good work!!

[@StarTalk]

Will do!

[@JediLoreen]

When I was a kid in the '60s, we still had milk delivery and the Helm's bakery truck would come by the neighborhood about once a week with bread and little cakes and other treats.

[@chanmax2]

Hello from France,Neil and Chuck! We have in France an astrophysicist, Roland Lehoucq, who is doing conferences about the science in science fiction movies. His most reknown work is "doing sciences with Star Wars" where he's explaining the force, measuring the power of a lightsaber, of the death star, even of the emperor's force lightning. He also speaking of the planets and everything you can see in the movies. It's time to learn some french and take a look a it.😉

[@derekseven1647]

Informative and fun as always.

[@julianthegodmusic]

Diving into the older videos. These will be used in schools for notes if they aren't already 😂 Love these. Morning ritual for me

[@beau-urns]

That goldilocks joke ended me Also I study surface temperature and use remote imagery. So that part was cool to be explained in simple terms

[@shakira.rahman8786]

I came to this channel for Dr. Tyson but I gotta be honest, at this point i think i might not even mind if Dr. Tyson was not in these videos and it was just Chuck. Chuck Nice outshines everytime❤️

[@rebeckamiller5158]

Love watching and learning new things everyday

[@nacholibre4516]

My guess is that if you had a particular thick pizza the insides will still be frozen and the outside will be charcoal. It will be kinda impossible to bake a pizza to an editable standard on venus. No matter how long or short the baking time.

[@NathanielEssex]

You're not calculating the carry over rest time. Think BBQ or grilled steak.

[@dotpace7284]

Neil and Chuck keep me in stitches and I love these explainers!

[@dunderwood4444]

Lord Nice is indeed a intellectual man of mystery. Outstanding dialog and episode. Allot of information compressed into a small episode. Well done Sir's/Doctor/Your Lordship Brooklyn NY loves StarTalk 💘 ❤ 💕 ♥ 💖 💗

[@gsav1320]

YESSSSSSS a chuck and Neil only episode is the besttttt. (Love the guests too but the these ones have a special place in my heart)

[@demianvandenberghe1784]

Love this format!

[@carsmax]

Guys, after work relax program !! Love you and your show !!!!!!👏

[@thembamahlangu9028]

the jokes and laughter in this channel make up for most concepts that goes over my head

[@bryanhikes7248]

I feel like this is an old episode put up again. But maybe yall just reiterated things from something older but I love it none the less.

[@nimrodlevy]

YES!!!! Long explainer!!!!! Loved it!!!! Many many many thanks!!!!

[@StarTalk]

You’re very very very welcome!

[@irismiranda1225]

Hilarious and educational. For those who didn’t understand Chuck’s joke about Fall and Spring, this was related to the fact that Puerto Ricans have a very diverse gene pool. When I see Mr. Neil I suspect I am related to him. So sad I can’t show him my great grandmother portrait.

[@lous3408]

love learning and the videos

[@JCRandall]

Professor Tyson.... Just an FYI you only need a quarter wave antenna to receive radio signals in fact most TV antennae that you was mentioning are only quarter wave. And by the way the longer wavelengths were in meters for example the CB channels were also called 11 m because the wavelength was 11 m. Now you going to look up and see information regarding half wavelength and tennis keep in mind the other half in a quarter wave antenna is the Earth reflector which can be the cable itself that feeds the antenna

[@chrispools]

Watching the lot from the UK. Absolutely love both these guys, brilliant

[@markpereira7972]

"In the wintertime I hang out..." Chuck, that was hilarious!!! No you won't get cancelled, we love you.

[@wmichael78]

I am thoroughly addicted to this series! Dr. Tyson is our modern-day Einstein!

[@SiqueScarface]

27:30 And this was the original motivation to the Heisenberg Uncertainity principle: If you use smaller and smaller wavelengths to get more and more detail, you finally get to wave energies so high they will obliterate whatever you are trying to look at, or in Physics parlay, if you want to get the location more and more exact, you are exacting more and more of an impulse to the thing you are looking at, meaning you will never have both location and impulse exact.

[@jasonsangwin4006]

StarTalk is so good, I'm not sure if it was the intent to also appeal to kids but my kids both love Neil and Chuck.

[@fraliexb]

With the whole Venus pizza baking situation, don't forget the original items are all exposed to that temperature and pressure the entire time of preparation also, so your pizza is over-baked by the time you're done laying the pepperoni.

[@iwantudead34]

Best podcast on the internet

[@gazw9595]

M9st contradicting podcast

[@root0062]

We need chuck back please !!

[@TheJtyork420]

I love star wars too and would love to see that episode. One for star trek too and all other sci-fi series like Stargate etc.

[@sarasrandomz]

On a completely startalk unrelated topic, I am absolutely in love with those lillies sitting to Niel's left 🤩

[@AmyK007]

You guys are awesome 😁

[@1d1hamby]

It's cooler under a tree in the summer not only because of the shade, but also because of evaporative cooling from the moisture loss from the tree.

[@zhubajie6940]

Then add on emissivity, absorbtivity, reflectivity versus frequency, the frequency distribution of the EM waves, and view factor when dealing with radiative heat transfer. I was surprised you didn't mention the black body concept for Chuck to riff on.

[@EricJamesSwearingen]

Another factor would be the pressure of the atmosphere adding to the transference of heat into your pizza on Venus. Right?

[@phyllisschapiro7894]

Love this show and Dr Tyson. And now for something completely different: Chuck, where did you get that faboo light fixture?!! And is it actually a fan???

[@marcusm8009]

It's so Nice to see you!

[@thirstfast1025]

It's easy to explain that you need an antenna the same length as the wave to detect it. But why is it that you can contort that antenna into any shape (including making it more compact), and it still will receive? Cheers!

[@mrlucky5025]

Practical antennae can be 1/9th to full wave in length. They work when contorted or folded into odd shapes because radio waves are 3 dimensional and affect the resonating elements simultaneously.

[@Sammasambuddha]

Also, you don't need 100% of the signal to get the message. A coiled antenna gets most not all of a signal.

[@plab0187]

You absolutley DO NOT need an antenna as long as the wave - Neil is out of his depth by a factor of 2, 4, or possibly 9.

[@thetruthspeaker1978]

I'm not sure why the algorithm took this long to introduce Star Talk to me but today it has finally happened and it's safe to say I'm in love ❤️💯👍😎

[@narayanf1]

I loved the closing comment by Neil! Connecting us closer to the coming and going of society.

[@facelessqueenie8873]

Chuck is going to have some of the best memories to leave for his children and grandchildren. They will probably love all things astrophysics and comedy... so cool

[@Anti-HyperLink]

I often get déjà vu while watching these and I can never tell if you've re-uploaded something or if you're just doing things again. Sometimes it's a topic (you've definitely done some things more than once) and sometimes it's something said like "things you never knew you never knew."

[@Wstarlights]

Chuck droppin it @ 9:40 !! 🙃😃

[@sonkamehameha1572]

I love Star Wars and I love Startalk. Yes Chuck please do that episode "Fixing Star Wars"

[@rolandorzabal1955]

These two guys have great chemistry. When one is gone it done feel the same

[@PinkMoonisGonnaGetYou]

Dr. Tyson, classy on race as ever.

[@jmanj3917]

Around 32:10 or so; Chuck sounds like Eric Cartman trying to figure out who his father is...lol

[@SonuKumar-ky1th]

I am learning science once again in my 30s. Really great content❤

[@JJs_playground]

Chuck's quick wit is so impressive. Lol.. he's so funny.

[@TheFeo2e]

I was a weather balloon observer in McMurdo, Antarctica in the winter of 1989. I received an upper air sounding launched at the south pole where the surface temp was - 83°C...as the balloon ascended, the temperature rose to -25 @ 3K feet and went isothermal for about 1500 feet... then it dropped steadily until it hit the tropopause around 25k feet and went isothermal at -81 for a couple thousand feet or so... then increased steadily until the balloon popped around 70k feet the temperature never got colder than the surface...true story

[@tevinmagadani3201]

I hope one day Dr Tyson and Mr Nice do an episode featuring Dr Gabriel Oyiba an African who solved a theory of everything creating a theorem for the first time in modern science, the last man to do so was Professor Pharaoh Akhenaten of ancient Kemet

[@Leezeo]

Love it

[@Mee399]

Amazing ❤️

[@SteveC38]

Nice Talk, Fellas 👍

[@mondezulu4312]

I'm an 8th grader it's been a year since I've been watching startalk.My curiosity on Physics and astronomy is on its own high level but it's sometimes hard to understand the explanations because of the terminology.

[@jeffreytroublefield4265]

Don't give up. I'm 50 and just now going back and trying to learn. Keep it up.

[@ironmantis778]

17:00 chuck did a Professor Fink impression! "Hoyven glaven!"

[@fl0w822]

More like this!

[@johnherron3961]

Love Chuck!

[@drako7222]

Therefore, a pizza delivery place on Venus could send the driver with an uncooked pizza in a shielded vehicle and just seconds before reaching you it would open a shield for the pizza for a few seconds and your pizza arrives as fresh as possible

[@ballubodalawala7662]

Most underrated podcast

[@Redkisses]

The perfect Duo ❤

[@yo8shu]

Hi. Moust portable and mobile antennas are smaller than the wavelength of the working frecvency. Moust antennas are at around lambda/4 working frecvency where lambda is wavelength of frecvency. Lambda is 3*10⁸/freq in Hz.

[@lemongavine]

Chuck has the coolest-looking ceiling fan.

[@yusefweb3693]

comedy and science, this is 🤩

[@stefh5963]

Thanks!

[@N037O]

As a Puerto Rican I find Chuck's comment hilarious.

[@evilmarken]

I watch for the 2 banter and how you learn more

[@jerseygurl620]

I would love to see Neil's entire recording space, cuz that roman column looks sooo outta place. 🤣

[@badsport504]

I Love This Channel

[@anthonyperez7428]

Just in case anyone was wondering this, there actually are around 60 million horses on Earth.

[@buddy.abc123]

Mind blown once again

[@davidburton3447]

also under a tree, you would have the slight temp drop from all the water evaporating from the leaves. as we know the phase shift from liquid to gas robs heat.

[@anamariaflecha2522]

I just love Neil’s laugh 😂😂😂😂

[@primiq]

The Icarus story is hilarious guys, brilliant !

[@Singe0255]

Thought I was going crazy with a dejavu moment, until I did a search and saw this was content released 7 months ago in the smaller segment format as three separate vids. Pro form, Startalk channel managers, got me to produce 4x likes out of one recording. It's like you split the beam with a prism and let me see it's component colors, then recombined it as white light again so I could marvel at its original glory. Bravo!

[@myadvocatusofficial]

Sagan Moment 🔥

[@JonDaGoat]

If we can find a way to get a nuclear warhead to detonate as close as possible to a black hole... would that not give us the ability to locate its counterpart white hole by looking for the emitted light or signature partials of said detonation? The thoughts in my head... :/

[@michaelbraum77]

As antiquated as a stick of dynamite is, I would love to know how many sticks a kiloton or megaton has in it. Anyone willing to show the math for it? I'll leave this tab open to see if someone does the math for me, and anyone else who is wondering! Also, I think "5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and they're off!" would be a better launch statement for 37 million horses than 5, 4, 3, 2 Yahhhh!"

[@mdm4504]

Horsepower as a unit was developed by James Watt at the end of the 18th century to aid in the sales of his steam engines. It was common for machinery to be powered by one or more horses walking around a pole to turn a shaft to drive a machine. (Like a merry-go-round in reverse) His calculation I believe somewhat overestimated the continuous power a horse could deliver so he didn't oversell his engines. That way he could tell a mine or factory owner you have been using say 6 horses to drive your machinery, here's how much you could save by using my 10 horsepower steam engine.

[@troyyork1554]

A easier and better explanation that Neil deGrasse Tyson could have done would be talking about different space heaters and the radiant heaters that are superior for heating the room