4.5 Things Cosmos Gets Wrong

In The Federalist Today, I have a piece titled Five Things Neil deGrasse Tyson’s “Cosmos” Gets Wrong

So why do I say 4.5 in my title here? One of them is more of a style issue than an error. I could have made it a solid 5, by talking about the gaffe wherein space travel is portrayed as zipping around a minefield of asteroids - in reality you are even less likely to get hit by an asteroid in space than you are on Earth, space is that big - but if the asteroid error is of interest, Brian Koberlein at Universe Today devotes a whole article to it.

I had already wondered why we were hearing sound in space and didn't want to carp on the space thing twice. I get that it's a spaceship of the imagination but if it's Neil's imagination, why isn't it more accurate? If it's my imagination, as I said, there will be no sound and Alessandra Ambrosio will be the captain. Sorry Neil.


If you are willing to buy a multiverse, it is entirely plausible Alessandra Ambrosio is the captain of the ship traversing infinite worlds. Credit: Gossip Journal

However, in the interest of gender equality, if you want Neil to be your imaginary captain and just want to have him as young as
Alessandra Ambrosio
when you both wonder how sound travels through space, here you go: 


Brilliant, a terrific communicator and totally badass.  Link: Neogaf, which also has a pic of him looking like he could star in "Luke Cage: Hero For Hire."

I have gotten some chiding for stating that global warming did not create the atmosphere on Venus. Well, that is accurate. CO2 did not cause the Greenhouse Effect, the proximity to the sun and weak gravity did. When water vapor rose and was exposed to radiation, the molecules got broken and their light hydrogen atoms had no gravity to keep them in the atmosphere so they left, meaning water could never form. Without liquid water to dissolve the CO2 from things like volcanoes - as it does on Earth - CO2 went crazy and boosted the heat even more. But the CO2 was the effect, not the cause.

Five Things Neil deGrasse Tyson’s “Cosmos” Gets Wrong - The Federalist

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