A science communicator and astrophysicist. He is the Hayden Planetarium's Frederick P. Rose director at the Rose Center for Earth and Space and has written multiple top selling books as well as been featured in many science documentaries.

The prospect of complex life elsewhere in the galaxy

The different levels of truths

The problem of political partisanship

Sam Harris speaks with Neil deGrasse Tyson about our place in the universe. They discuss our current understanding of extra-solar planets, the prospect that there is complex life elsewhere in the galaxy, the Fermi problem, the possibility that all advanced civilizations self destruct, how we can detect life on exoplanets, recent media interest in UFOs, whether a direct encounter with alien life would change our world, the flat-Earth conspiracy, the public understanding of science, the problem of political partisanship, racial inequality, and other topics. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.   Learning how to train your mind is the single greatest investment you can make in life. That’s why Sam Harris created the Waking Up app. From rational mindfulness practice to lessons on some of life’s most important topics, join Sam as he demystifies the practice of meditation and explores the theory behind it.

Making Sense with Sam Harris

Sam Harris speaks with Neil deGrasse Tyson about our place in the universe. They discuss our current understanding of extra-solar planets, the prospect that there is complex life elsewhere in the galaxy, the Fermi problem, the possibility that all advanced civilizations self destruct, how we can detect life on exoplanets, recent media interest in UFOs, whether a direct encounter with alien life would change our world, the flat-Earth conspiracy, the public understanding of science, the problem of political partisanship, racial inequality, and other topics. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at <a href="http://samharris.org/subscribe" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">samharris.org/subscribe</a>. Learning how to train your mind is the single greatest investment you can make in life. That’s why Sam Harris created the <a href="http://wakingup.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Waking Up</a> app. From rational mindfulness practice to lessons on some of life’s most important topics, join Sam as he demystifies the practice of meditation and explores the theory behind it.

#252 — Are We Alone in the Universe?

Nowadays, if we had any encounter with extraterrestrial life forms, the ability for us to share this with others is significantly better than what it was. So with more sophisticated technology, we should expect stronger evidence, and in the latest sighting of alien spacecrafts, a fuzzy photo of something the size of a tic tac is just not good enough.

With the abundance of smartphone cameras and social media, the amount of reported alien abductions has almost gone to zero.

In almost all aspects, science has previously been wrong, as new &amp; better theories come out. In fact, it's the fundamental principle that science is focused on disproving what we currently know in order to find better explanations, that makes science trustworthy. But the good thing about science is, it's true whether or not you believe in it.

Science isn't concerned with only the truth itself, it's more about the process of uncovering truths.

There is no better moment than now for many of the problems we as a society face, it was almost always worse. And although there is still much to do, the only place we'd want to go is into the future, because the arc of progress bends towards justice.

If we invented a time machine, there is no other time in the past that oppressed minorities would want to go.

Can you think about how you can better apply the scientific process of truth in your life?

"It's not only enough to know &amp; speak the truth, you have to know &amp; do what's effective."