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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With

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Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone,

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Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff. My name is Chris Poulett, and

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Speaker 1: I'm an editor at how stuff works dot com. Sitting

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Speaker 1: across from me as usual, its senior writer Jonathan Strickland.

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Speaker 1: All my bags are packed, I'm ready to go. I'm

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Speaker 1: standing here outside your door. I hate to wake you

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Speaker 1: up to say goodbye. Okay, clearly you have been seen Armagedon. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I have. I just tried to put it out of

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Speaker 1: my head that that song's in it. And we're gonna

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Speaker 1: be talking about asteroids and preventing a collision with Earth

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Speaker 1: and what sort of tech would be involved with that.

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Speaker 1: And this comes courtesy of some Facebook requests and email requests.

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Speaker 1: I can't believe that we had people send us multiple

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Speaker 1: people sent us this request, which seems really specific for

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Speaker 1: more than one person. But hey, we're gonna do it.

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Speaker 1: And um, you know, if you have seen the documentary Armagedon,

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Speaker 1: you remember that we shot Bruce Willis up into space

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Speaker 1: um with Ben Affleck and some other folks like Steve

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Speaker 1: Bussemmy to scare an asteroid out of the way, because

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Speaker 1: Steve Bussummey is a scary guy. Uh wait, I think

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Speaker 1: I might be. I think I might be a little

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Speaker 1: off track. Oh well, anyway, the premise of the movie

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Speaker 1: was that there was this enormous asteroid the size of Texas,

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Speaker 1: which put the way, not that guy, do you do? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: That that's that's a reference that goes over everyone's head

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Speaker 1: because no one, none of our listeners have ever played

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Speaker 1: the game Asteroids. Any really, some of you have played

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Speaker 1: Asteroids and maybe maybe, uh maybe our our buddy Floyd

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Speaker 1: the truck driver, he might have hopefully not while driving.

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Speaker 1: Well I hope not. Anyway, we're getting off track already.

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Speaker 1: So the whole, the whole premise of the movie is

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Speaker 1: that there's this giant asteroid the size of Texas that's

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Speaker 1: going to be flying at Earth. And so they come

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Speaker 1: up with this idea where they scramble a bunch of

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Speaker 1: of uh minors essentially to shoot up into space, land

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Speaker 1: on the asteroid, and plant a nuclear device on the

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Speaker 1: asteroid that will blow it up to tiny little bits

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Speaker 1: and save the Earth. And so we want to address

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Speaker 1: this um this first, so let's let's get this all

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Speaker 1: the way. That would not work. That would that would

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Speaker 1: be a bad thing. First of all, the power of

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Speaker 1: such a device is hard to imagine. How would you

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Speaker 1: create a nuclear device powerful enough to explode texas into

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Speaker 1: tiny bits the equivalent of texas flying at you. Also,

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Speaker 1: by the way, an asteroid that size would pretty much

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Speaker 1: wipe out everybody. Um. You know, when we talk about

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Speaker 1: asteroids that are are dangerous enough to wipe out a city,

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Speaker 1: fifty yards is big enough. A fifty yard asteroid like

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Speaker 1: asteroid fifty yards across, we have enough power, enough enough

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Speaker 1: force to destroy a city if it impacted the city. Um. Now,

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Speaker 1: NASA classifies earth threatening asteroids as being a hundred and

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Speaker 1: forty meters or larger. But then that conveniently is about

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Speaker 1: the size that we can detect them. Well, it's uh,

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Speaker 1: it's important to note too that it's happened before. You know,

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Speaker 1: we have been hit with with many space objects in

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Speaker 1: the past, and I assume to some small degree continue

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Speaker 1: to do so, like something that we hear about in

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Speaker 1: the news every day, But every single day the Earth

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Speaker 1: is hit by by tiny little object. Granted we haven't

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Speaker 1: been hit by a massive asteroid in a really long time.

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Speaker 1: But meteorites hit the Earth every day. Sometimes they're so

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Speaker 1: small that you know, they're almost undetectable, but it does

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Speaker 1: happen the But yeah, they've happened in the past. I mean,

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Speaker 1: that's what wiped out the dinosaurs was an asteroid impact

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Speaker 1: or possibly common impact, but it was a massive impact

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Speaker 1: that that altered the Earth's climate, and dinosaurs did not

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Speaker 1: have air conditioning, so they were pretty much doomed. Doomed.

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Speaker 1: I figured it was their debaucherous lifestyle and it was unsustainable.

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Speaker 1: Now you're thinking of Rome, right, you know, I get

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Speaker 1: this confused a lot. Yeah, well, you know, if you've

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Speaker 1: ever seen a t rex in Atoga never mind, So

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Speaker 1: so why would this plan not work with destroying an

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Speaker 1: asteroid with a nuclear device. Let's assume that, for for

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Speaker 1: argument's sake, that somehow you managed to find a nuclear

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Speaker 1: device capable of breaking up a Texas sized asteroid while

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Speaker 1: it was hurtling towards Earth. And keep in mind this

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Speaker 1: was this this asteroid was close to Earth by the

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Speaker 1: time it blows up. Otherwise it's not nearly as dramatic

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Speaker 1: an ending. Right, of course, you've gotta have it close

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Speaker 1: enough to the Earth where people are starting really freak out.

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Speaker 1: Oh and how long exactly did they have to prepare

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Speaker 1: for this. It was like a couple of days or

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Speaker 1: something like that. It was crazy short time period. We

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Speaker 1: would know. Yeah, anything that's anything that that size, we

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Speaker 1: would be able to spot between Mars and Jupiter, giving

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Speaker 1: us years, literally years to prepare. It would not be

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Speaker 1: a last minute thing. And um, that's one of the

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Speaker 1: myths that movies perpetuate is that you know, you have

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Speaker 1: some uh, some some amateur astronomer out in the middle

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Speaker 1: of nowhere just looking up and saying, that's weird that

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Speaker 1: star wasn't there yesterday. And then and then that information

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Speaker 1: slowly filters its way to some official source, which immediately

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Speaker 1: clamps down and keeps it all secret so that nobody

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Speaker 1: knows that doom is on the way until it leaks

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Speaker 1: to the media causing a panic. Yeah, that we don't

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Speaker 1: want to cause a panic. That's definitely Hollywood related. So

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Speaker 1: why would blowing up the asteroid not be a good idea? Well,

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Speaker 1: that asteroids moving at a really fast speed and the

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Speaker 1: nuclear warhead is not going to slow it down. Okay,

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Speaker 1: so you've still got this this material moving at an

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Speaker 1: incredible speed, and the mass isn't gone. You haven't destroyed

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Speaker 1: the mass, You've just spread it out some So instead

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Speaker 1: of it being a one massive asteroid hitting the Earth,

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Speaker 1: it's a whole bunch of them hitting the Earth. And

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Speaker 1: it's like the difference between getting hit by a slug

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Speaker 1: and getting hit by um shotgun shot. You know, you

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Speaker 1: just spread out the area of impact, is what you've done.

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Speaker 1: This is mission control. We just wanted to say, Oops, yeah,

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Speaker 1: are bad so um so yeah, here's here's while this

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Speaker 1: stuff would really work in the real world. All Right,

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Speaker 1: We've got lots of powerful telescopes pointing in all sorts

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Speaker 1: of directions. Now, so the the the myths of the

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Speaker 1: amateur astronomer who detects uh something the size the size

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Speaker 1: that's in depicted an armageddon is really that's that's busted

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Speaker 1: because it would be detected by much more powerful telescopes

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Speaker 1: much earlier, and um that information would go to uh

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Speaker 1: it's kind of a clearing house for near Earth objects

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Speaker 1: that could potentially cause harm. It's called the Minor Planet Center.

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Speaker 1: It's in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Now, the Minor Planet Center would

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Speaker 1: then take the information that was sent to it, which

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Speaker 1: usually would involve the size of the asteroid and it's

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Speaker 1: its shape of orbit around the Sun and whether that

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Speaker 1: orbit could potentially uh collide with the Earth. Send that

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Speaker 1: information out to observatories all across the planet. Now, these

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Speaker 1: observatories would then train their telescopes onto the object to

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Speaker 1: try and make their own calculations based upon their own

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Speaker 1: their own perspective, to see if perhaps this would be

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Speaker 1: a quote unquote interesting object. Now, in astronomical terms, interesting

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Speaker 1: means holy crap, we're all going to die. That's the

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Speaker 1: that's what they mean by interesting as in potentially impact

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Speaker 1: the Earth interesting. And that information would then be shared

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Speaker 1: amongst those observatories, and the likelihood of a clamp down

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Speaker 1: is really low, just because you have so many people

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Speaker 1: who would be involved in this and have the information,

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Speaker 1: and lots of them were gonna talk. A lot of

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Speaker 1: them we're gonna talk and say we gotta prepare now,

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Speaker 1: because if we don't, we're all going to die, or

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Speaker 1: a significant number of people are going to die. Because

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Speaker 1: if this asteroid hits a land mass, then it's gonna

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Speaker 1: be like, depending on the size of the asteroid, it

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Speaker 1: could be like the entire world's nuclear arsenal exploding in

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Speaker 1: a single point. Um. If it hits the ocean, then

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Speaker 1: it could generate a tsunami of unprecedented uh force that

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Speaker 1: could wipe out an entire coast of a of a continent. Um.

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Speaker 1: So I mean this is serious business. Uh. Fortunately, we

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Speaker 1: haven't discovered anything so far that would cause that much

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Speaker 1: of a problem. But again, our ability to detect these

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Speaker 1: objects is limited. Most of the objects that NASA concentrates

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Speaker 1: on is anything that's a higher and forty meters or

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Speaker 1: across or larger. And uh. The problem is that smaller

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Speaker 1: objects could cause significant harm. But finding those objects is

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Speaker 1: a lot trickier because space is big. Really, Yeah, and

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Speaker 1: in relation to space, fifty yard across asteroid or is nothing.

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Speaker 1: It's it's you know, you you it's it's impossible to

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Speaker 1: exaggerate how tiny that is. Yeah, it's like a it's

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Speaker 1: like a germ on a bug. And and and you

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Speaker 1: happen to be like a blue whale. That's kind of

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Speaker 1: and even then that's not even close that Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: can't get my mind around it. That's that's how it is.

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Speaker 1: So so all right, So nuking a an asteroid directly

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Speaker 1: as in trying to blow it up is not a

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Speaker 1: feasible option. So let's let's assume for the moment that

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Speaker 1: we have developed technology that helps us, that has improved

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Speaker 1: our ability to detect asteroids to the point where any

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Speaker 1: asteroid that could potentially cause significant harm to people on Earth,

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Speaker 1: to life on Earth, that we have somehow managed to

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Speaker 1: to create the technology to detect it. Yeah, all right,

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Speaker 1: and it's and it's important to do so because it

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Speaker 1: is probable that we will be hit by something largish

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Speaker 1: again at some point, essentially, like it's worthwhile to to

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Speaker 1: develop this technology exactly. So yeah, the the risk might

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Speaker 1: be low, but the impact would be huge. So you know,

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Speaker 1: even taking a low risk perspective of it, the actual

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Speaker 1: impact would be so enormous that it is a good argument,

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Speaker 1: and a lot of people have made this argument to

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Speaker 1: UM to invest in technology to help prevent it from happening.

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Speaker 1: So let's assume that we have improved technology so we

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Speaker 1: can actually detect these asteroids from a pretty good distance.

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Speaker 1: Like I said, it might be years before they get here,

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Speaker 1: or we're gonna need that time because we're gonna need

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Speaker 1: that time to develop the actual vehicles that the tools

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Speaker 1: that we're going to use in order to intercept that asteroid.

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Speaker 1: So by intercepting it, what could we do to to

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Speaker 1: avoid a collision. Well, the real key is deflecting the asteroid.

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Speaker 1: You just have to move it a tiny bit, especially

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Speaker 1: the further out you go. The further out you go,

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Speaker 1: the tinier that that adjustment needs to be, because by

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Speaker 1: the time it gets to the Earth, it's going to

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Speaker 1: be the distance is going to be much more enormous.

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Speaker 1: You know. Just think about like you're walking to have

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Speaker 1: a friend standing across from you across a football field,

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Speaker 1: and you're both facing each other exactly. Now, imagine that

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Speaker 1: your friend just turns slightly a little bit to the

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Speaker 1: left and starts walking forward. Well, from a distance, it

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Speaker 1: looks like there that your friend may actually meet up

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Speaker 1: with you once they get all the way across the

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Speaker 1: football field. But as they continue, you see that they're

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Speaker 1: getting further and further away until they reach essentially a

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Speaker 1: point parallel to you, and they are a good distance

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Speaker 1: from you right there, further down the field, like further

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Speaker 1: to the right or to the left, whichever way that

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Speaker 1: the person turned. Um, that's kind of the idea here

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Speaker 1: is that if you can catch an asteroid early enough

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Speaker 1: and deflect it just a couple of degrees. Then you've

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Speaker 1: solved the problem because it's going to miss the Earth

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Speaker 1: by millions of miles. But how do you deflect it? Well,

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Speaker 1: there's a lot of different options. Yeah, I read uh

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Speaker 1: too specifically, that seemed to be the options people are

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Speaker 1: thinking of most what's that um One of them, ironically enough,

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Speaker 1: was to use nuclear devices, but not to destroy, but

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Speaker 1: to nudge. Right. Yeah, the idea is being that you

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Speaker 1: would you would detonate the device over the asteroid. This

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Speaker 1: would actually um cause a couple of things to happen,

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Speaker 1: and it's you know, it's interesting that again that we're

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Speaker 1: talking about something. You know, you might say, hey, you

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Speaker 1: just said nuking is bad. Well, in this case, what

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Speaker 1: would happen is that you would uh create an uh

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Speaker 1: A nuclear radiation would create this this vaporizing energy and

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Speaker 1: vaporize the surface or a section of the surface of

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Speaker 1: the asteroid. Now that's going to cause that part of

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Speaker 1: the surface to eject material into space. And you know,

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Speaker 1: for a react action, there's an equal and opposite reaction,

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Speaker 1: So that ejection from space is actually going to act

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Speaker 1: as a pushing force on the asteroid and it's tiny,

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Speaker 1: but that's all you need necessarily know, that might be

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Speaker 1: all you need to move that asteroid out of the

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Speaker 1: pathway of the Earth. So yeah, you, um you're just

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Speaker 1: using it again to to give the asteroid a little push. Um. Actually,

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Speaker 1: most of the the options I've seen are some variation

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Speaker 1: on pushing the asteroid. It's just lots of different potential

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Speaker 1: ways we could do that. Well, that's true. I did read, uh, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: to be fair, I did read of the possibility of

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Speaker 1: using an inert uh device, nothing that explodes, but basically

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Speaker 1: a bullet if you will, to shove. Yeah, using using

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Speaker 1: kinetic force to push the asteroid out of the way. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that is another potential UM solution, although it's it's again

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Speaker 1: one of those that that has its own set of difficulties.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, that's that is what I've also heard, where

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Speaker 1: you're just using a kinetic force to to tap the

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Speaker 1: asteroid out of the way. And it's it's important to

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Speaker 1: note that. Um. What we really can't stress how much

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Speaker 1: detection and identifying the the object path how important that is.

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Speaker 1: Because um, there there's an effect called the Yarkovsky effect.

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Speaker 1: Did you read about this, um as the object gets

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Speaker 1: close to the Sun, closer to the Sun UM. And

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Speaker 1: I'm not talking about directly on a path too, but

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Speaker 1: you know, as it gets closer and closer to the

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Speaker 1: Sun in the center of our solar system, it's going

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Speaker 1: to heat up. UM. And for a larger object it

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Speaker 1: doesn't matter so much UM. But according uh to an

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Speaker 1: article that I um than in an article I read,

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Speaker 1: the Arkovsky effect basically means that once the the object

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Speaker 1: starts to heat up, the heat can affect its path.

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Speaker 1: It can basically start it to move in a slightly

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Speaker 1: different direction. So you need to be able to We

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Speaker 1: would need to be able to know exactly where the

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Speaker 1: or as least as close enough to uh, where the

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Speaker 1: object is going to be, so that we can accurately

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Speaker 1: hit it with something if we're going to try to

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Speaker 1: use a brute force method of moving the the asteroid

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Speaker 1: out of the way, And a lot of the attempts

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Speaker 1: to move asteroids may depend upon sun, the sunlight and

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Speaker 1: the Sun's power because um, there are a lot of

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Speaker 1: different options that would harness the power of the Sun

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Speaker 1: in order to create a pulling effect or pushing effect

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Speaker 1: on the the asteroid. For example, there's one UM. One

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Speaker 1: possible technique where we would coat the asteroid with white

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Speaker 1: and dark coating like paint or dust or whatever, and

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Speaker 1: that would uh cause it to move because the Sun's

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Speaker 1: energy would actually push against the asteroid. And if we

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Speaker 1: coded the rights the correct side, not the right side,

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Speaker 1: I mean there's no real right or left, but the

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Speaker 1: correct side of the asteroid, it could push the asteroid

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Speaker 1: those couple of degrees. By the time it gets to

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Speaker 1: where the Earth is, it's millions of miles away, you know,

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Speaker 1: it's it's millions of miles off course from hitting the Earth. Um. Similarly,

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Speaker 1: there were suggestions that maybe we could create a solar

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Speaker 1: sale that would attach we we would use a like

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Speaker 1: a probe to attach a solar sale to an asteroid,

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Speaker 1: and the solar sale would catch the Sun's energy and

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Speaker 1: be propelled by the solar wind, essentially to pull the

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Speaker 1: asteroid again outside of its pathway. UM. That that's kind

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Speaker 1: of a far fetched one. Really, It's definitely a lot

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Speaker 1: more challenging than say, coding an asteroid with a light

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Speaker 1: colored material. UM. But then there's also the idea of

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Speaker 1: using a net, an enormous net to encapsulate the the

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Speaker 1: asteroid and the net would again act as almost like

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Speaker 1: a solar sail. It would it would react against you know,

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Speaker 1: the sun. The Sun's energy would push against the net,

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Speaker 1: which again would alter the course of the asteroid. UM.

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Speaker 1: Mirrors are another potential UH solution, where you you launch

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Speaker 1: a device that is going to deploy mirrors around the

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Speaker 1: asteroid to direct sunlight to specific points in the asteroid

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Speaker 1: to again push it out of the way. Um. Well,

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Speaker 1: everyone knows that asteroids are veins. If you, you know,

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Speaker 1: put the mirrors on the far side of the Earth,

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Speaker 1: they'll go toward the mirrors and go, oh, just my

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Speaker 1: best side, I look good. Um. But then there are

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Speaker 1: a couple of other elements. There are a couple of

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Speaker 1: other ways of nudging an asteroid all the way that

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Speaker 1: don't involve sunlight at all. Uh. And one of them,

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Speaker 1: one of them's strapping a rocket to it. So essentially

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Speaker 1: you have a UM, we have to land somebody on

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Speaker 1: the asteroid. No, not necessarily, you'd have to have some

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Speaker 1: sort of of remotely operated probe that could embed into

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Speaker 1: the asteroid itself and then use um, have enough fuel

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Speaker 1: in it to be able to push as a rocket

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Speaker 1: to push the asteroid out of the way of the

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Speaker 1: pathway of collision. Now it doesn't have to push very hard,

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Speaker 1: it doesn't have to push for very long. Again, as

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Speaker 1: long as you catch the asteroid early enough that we

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Speaker 1: have to keep stressing that this is. This is assuming

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Speaker 1: that we capture, that we detect the asteroid and years

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Speaker 1: and years and years in advance, and that we're able

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Speaker 1: to react quickly enough so that by the time the

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Speaker 1: probe reaches the asteroid. Because you remember, this isn't gonna

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Speaker 1: be overnight. It's gonna take time for the for whatever

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Speaker 1: solution we deploy to get to the asteroid. Like it,

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Speaker 1: maybe you know, we launched something and we don't know

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Speaker 1: if it's going to work for another two years or

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Speaker 1: three years. I mean, it's kind of scary to think about,

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Speaker 1: but that's true. So um, yeah, you have to figure

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Speaker 1: out away where you have this this device, and it

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Speaker 1: has to be able to carry enough fuel so that

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Speaker 1: it can actually deploy properly. A lot of people suggest

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Speaker 1: that this kind of approach would be best if it

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Speaker 1: were already space born. So in other words, we already

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Speaker 1: had some sort of launching platform in space, so that

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Speaker 1: the uh, the individual probes would not need so much

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Speaker 1: fuel to both escape the arts gravity and land on

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Speaker 1: an asteroid and then propel it away. Um. That that

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Speaker 1: does prose a problem. But then another one is the

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Speaker 1: gravity tractor. Ah, yes, and I when I looked up

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Speaker 1: the gravity tractor, I had to check just a moment ago.

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Speaker 1: And yes, someone has named their band gravity Tractor. Good

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Speaker 1: for them, Yeah, lead singer John Dear, nice, thank you. Um,

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Speaker 1: but yeah, the gravity tractor is fascinating, um, because this

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Speaker 1: is essentially using a different body and the gravity of

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Speaker 1: another body and body that we would launch into space

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Speaker 1: to pull the asteroid away without even I mean it's

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Speaker 1: not the point here is not even a touch the asteroid.

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Speaker 1: It's to get something near enough to it to affect

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Speaker 1: um the asteroids path with another gravitational field, right, Because

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Speaker 1: you gotta remember everything in the universe exerts a gravitational

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Speaker 1: pull on everything else. It's just that that poll is

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Speaker 1: dependent upon distance and mass and lots of other stuff.

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Speaker 1: But they you know, so if you were able to

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Speaker 1: put a massive enough object close enough to the asteroid,

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Speaker 1: you could alter its pathway. There is there are some

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Speaker 1: problems with the gravity tractor, really, Yeah. One of them

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Speaker 1: is that you have to figure out all a. Well,

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Speaker 1: you want the gravity tractor to pull the asteroid away

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Speaker 1: from the path of collision. You don't want the asteroid

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Speaker 1: to pull the gravity tractor into the path of collision.

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Speaker 1: So so that means that you would have to have

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Speaker 1: some sort of propole sustion system aboard the gravity tractor

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Speaker 1: to make little course corrections and continue to gently pull

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Speaker 1: the asteroid out of its pathway. Well, if you have propulsion,

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Speaker 1: then there's the possibility of that propulsion that you're going

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Speaker 1: to when you fire your rockets to to give it

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Speaker 1: a boost, that force may push against the asteroid, thus

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Speaker 1: negating the gravity pull that you are exerting upon it.

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Speaker 1: So essentially you're getting a net zero result because that

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Speaker 1: you're you're pulling on it with gravity, but you're pushing

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Speaker 1: on it with your propulsion system. So finding a way

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Speaker 1: where you could create some sort of gravity tractor where

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Speaker 1: the propulsion system would not actually push against the asteroid

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Speaker 1: itself is would be part of the solution. Plus this

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Speaker 1: would be really really expensive. It's a much more costly

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Speaker 1: approach and not necessarily uh the most easy to implement

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Speaker 1: compared to other approaches. So I don't know that this

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Speaker 1: is necessarily likely to happen. I mean, if if enough

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Speaker 1: research goes into it where it proves that this is

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Speaker 1: the most effective way, then sure I can see it happening,

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Speaker 1: just because people would finally say, all right, well, you know,

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Speaker 1: we have to invest in it, because we can't. We

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Speaker 1: can't just play roulette all our existence. We have to

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Speaker 1: prepare for this. But I would imagine that we'd probably

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Speaker 1: go with some other route before we tried this one. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: An article I read suggested that the the gravity tractor

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Speaker 1: would have to be at least uh twenty tons in

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Speaker 1: order to safely to you know, effectively to I should say,

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Speaker 1: not safely effectively to and an asteroid away from the Earth. Um,

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Speaker 1: and I can't you know, I just imagine that's going

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Speaker 1: to be very hard to get out of the Earth's orbit.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, our gravity. I'm sorry to leave

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Speaker 1: the gravitational field of the Earth to launch something that

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Speaker 1: big in the space. But you know, I'm not a

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Speaker 1: rocket scientist, so nor are you a brain surgeon. Now

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Speaker 1: I'm not a rocket surgeon either, so um, well that's good.

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Speaker 1: I can just imagine that going wrong. So I've got

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Speaker 1: another another potential, although it's far fetched possibility of getting

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Speaker 1: rid of an asteroid that um that's coming at you.

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Speaker 1: You let robots eat it. Really, Yeah, that's Robert Lamb

397
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Speaker 1: actually wrote about this. He has a great article on

398
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Speaker 1: the Our Our Discovery news site called top ten ways

399
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Speaker 1: to stop an asteroid, and one of them is talking

400
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Speaker 1: about using them robots that would actually essentially kind of

401
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Speaker 1: chew up the asteroid and then shoot out the tiny

402
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Speaker 1: bits of asteroid uh into space electromagnetically UM and essentially

403
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Speaker 1: disperse the asteroid while it's still really, really really far

404
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Speaker 1: away from the Earth. Because keep in mind, if it's

405
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Speaker 1: really far away from the Earth, then not all of

406
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Speaker 1: that mass is going to hit the Earth the way

407
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Speaker 1: it would in the beginning of UM the or or

408
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Speaker 1: at the end of arm again rather So, Yeah, these

409
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Speaker 1: these robots UH eating poop, They eat asteroids and they

410
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Speaker 1: poop asteroid dust. I am. I wanted to go there,

411
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Speaker 1: and I said, no, I'm not gonna say it. You're

412
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Speaker 1: not gonna say they eating poop. Nope, But you did

413
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Speaker 1: it for me. So I can see the look on

414
00:24:22,440 --> 00:24:24,159
Speaker 1: your face, and I knew that you were thinking that.

415
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Speaker 1: So I was like, I'm going to do it. Um, Well,

416
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Speaker 1: I wanted to. Yeah, so this is this is definitely

417
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Speaker 1: something that we need to think about. I mean, it's

418
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Speaker 1: it's true that we need to think about invest in it.

419
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Speaker 1: There are some talks about private companies actually investing in

420
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Speaker 1: this UM sort of technology, this sort of approach UM,

421
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Speaker 1: which is kind of cool that you know, it's not

422
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Speaker 1: just not just depending upon governmental agencies that have lots

423
00:24:49,119 --> 00:24:52,520
Speaker 1: of different you know, things pulling on them. Um. I

424
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Speaker 1: did read that UM scientists don't seem to believe that

425
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Speaker 1: there's anything likely to hit us in the next hundred

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Speaker 1: years or so at the earliest, well at least nothing

427
00:25:01,680 --> 00:25:04,560
Speaker 1: that we can see. Yeah, exactly. So there's still the

428
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Speaker 1: possibility that something smaller it could hit and still cause

429
00:25:07,600 --> 00:25:11,040
Speaker 1: massive damage. It's just not gonna necessarily cause global damage,

430
00:25:11,119 --> 00:25:15,600
Speaker 1: but it could cause catastrophic local damage, you know. Um. Yeah,

431
00:25:15,600 --> 00:25:19,040
Speaker 1: there's some interesting organizations out there that are dedicated to

432
00:25:19,080 --> 00:25:21,359
Speaker 1: trying to fix this problem. There's one called the B

433
00:25:21,600 --> 00:25:26,359
Speaker 1: six one to Foundation, uh, and they their goal is

434
00:25:26,400 --> 00:25:31,280
Speaker 1: to have a workable solution by So that's coming up

435
00:25:31,320 --> 00:25:34,280
Speaker 1: pretty pretty soon. Um. If you guys want to learn

436
00:25:34,359 --> 00:25:36,920
Speaker 1: more about the topic, well, I can recommend a couple

437
00:25:36,960 --> 00:25:39,160
Speaker 1: of things and how stuff works. We actually have two

438
00:25:39,280 --> 00:25:41,680
Speaker 1: articles that you go into more detail about the stuff

439
00:25:41,680 --> 00:25:44,400
Speaker 1: we've talked about. One is called could we really blow

440
00:25:44,520 --> 00:25:47,640
Speaker 1: up an incoming asteroid with a nuclear bomb? And one

441
00:25:47,760 --> 00:25:49,880
Speaker 1: is called could we stop an asteroid on a collision

442
00:25:49,880 --> 00:25:54,080
Speaker 1: course towards the Earth? And also, uh, there's a great

443
00:25:54,080 --> 00:25:58,719
Speaker 1: program that aired on Discovery UM called Bad Universe, and

444
00:25:58,840 --> 00:26:01,680
Speaker 1: it was It's hosted by Phil Play the Bad Astronomer.

445
00:26:01,840 --> 00:26:05,000
Speaker 1: Phil Plate, by the way, one of my favorite bloggers

446
00:26:05,400 --> 00:26:07,960
Speaker 1: and scientists out there, because he's one of those scientists

447
00:26:08,640 --> 00:26:11,879
Speaker 1: who really dedicates his work to explaining science to the

448
00:26:11,960 --> 00:26:15,399
Speaker 1: layman in terms that are easy, easy to understand. It

449
00:26:15,440 --> 00:26:19,400
Speaker 1: makes science fun and exciting, and he does not shy

450
00:26:19,440 --> 00:26:23,159
Speaker 1: away from topics like this, where you know, he's like, yeah,

451
00:26:23,200 --> 00:26:25,359
Speaker 1: it'll kill you, so that's why I gotta fix it.

452
00:26:26,320 --> 00:26:29,160
Speaker 1: So he's very matter of fact about it. UM. Really

453
00:26:29,200 --> 00:26:32,000
Speaker 1: intelligent guy, very entertaining guy. So if you have not

454
00:26:32,160 --> 00:26:35,560
Speaker 1: read his stuff or watched his show, I do recommend

455
00:26:35,600 --> 00:26:38,400
Speaker 1: trying to catch that because it's he's a great guy.

456
00:26:38,400 --> 00:26:41,439
Speaker 1: And he also has a really amusing Twitter feed and

457
00:26:41,480 --> 00:26:44,960
Speaker 1: he interacts with a lot of other uh Twitter Wisenheimer's

458
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:48,199
Speaker 1: out there. Like Jonathan Colton, Paul and Storm you know,

459
00:26:48,400 --> 00:26:51,840
Speaker 1: um will be eaten. There's there's this kind of Twitter

460
00:26:51,920 --> 00:26:55,800
Speaker 1: rottie that have have formed up and uh and so

461
00:26:56,280 --> 00:27:00,880
Speaker 1: um he often will chat with those oaks and in

462
00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:03,040
Speaker 1: interesting and entertaining ways. And he's and he shares a

463
00:27:03,040 --> 00:27:06,040
Speaker 1: lot of really cool science news through his Twitter feed

464
00:27:06,040 --> 00:27:09,280
Speaker 1: as well. I showed you that that amazing photo of

465
00:27:09,560 --> 00:27:14,159
Speaker 1: the Space Shuttle Endeavor across the sun. Yeah, yeah, that

466
00:27:14,240 --> 00:27:17,280
Speaker 1: was that was courtesy of of Mr Phil Plate. So yeah,

467
00:27:17,359 --> 00:27:20,120
Speaker 1: he's written extensively about this and he's he's talked about

468
00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:22,160
Speaker 1: it in his blogs and on on on the show

469
00:27:22,200 --> 00:27:26,280
Speaker 1: Bad Universe. Um, so I recommend that as well. And uh, well,

470
00:27:26,359 --> 00:27:29,920
Speaker 1: I don't have any other potential solutions off the top

471
00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:31,320
Speaker 1: of my head. Do you have anything else you want

472
00:27:31,320 --> 00:27:35,080
Speaker 1: to add before we conclude? Not in particular? Now, Well, then, um,

473
00:27:35,119 --> 00:27:37,760
Speaker 1: I would suggest we all just take a moment to

474
00:27:38,000 --> 00:27:44,160
Speaker 1: uh to to ridicule the documentary Armageddon, uh for its

475
00:27:44,480 --> 00:27:48,760
Speaker 1: portrayal of how we would uh alter the course of

476
00:27:48,800 --> 00:27:51,120
Speaker 1: a of an asteroid by blowing it up real good,

477
00:27:51,720 --> 00:27:53,720
Speaker 1: uh Texas style. But you have to land a space

478
00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:56,800
Speaker 1: shuttle on it first. Yeah, and you have to sing

479
00:27:57,080 --> 00:27:59,359
Speaker 1: the song I quoted at the beginning at some point

480
00:27:59,520 --> 00:28:05,239
Speaker 1: and uh, and Bruce Willis has to die of spoiler alert. Yeah. Um.

481
00:28:05,760 --> 00:28:08,600
Speaker 1: I was interested in though, that scientists are also talking

482
00:28:08,640 --> 00:28:13,119
Speaker 1: about the possibility of of mining asteroids in a in

483
00:28:13,160 --> 00:28:16,360
Speaker 1: a in an attempt to understand them better. Um. Yeah,

484
00:28:16,400 --> 00:28:19,240
Speaker 1: I did read that. Uh. You know, although we may

485
00:28:19,280 --> 00:28:23,600
Speaker 1: not necessarily be ready to to destroy one just yet,

486
00:28:23,680 --> 00:28:28,600
Speaker 1: that scientists even alter its path, right right, Um, but

487
00:28:29,080 --> 00:28:31,920
Speaker 1: scientists are considering the possibility if uh, you know, since

488
00:28:31,960 --> 00:28:35,239
Speaker 1: they are tracking some asteroids that are coming near to

489
00:28:35,359 --> 00:28:38,480
Speaker 1: Earth and near and again space is big, so near

490
00:28:38,520 --> 00:28:41,960
Speaker 1: as a relative term. Um. But they're talking about the

491
00:28:42,000 --> 00:28:47,760
Speaker 1: idea of visiting some near Earth asteroids with the possibility

492
00:28:47,760 --> 00:28:51,120
Speaker 1: of mining, you know, taking some samples of the rocks

493
00:28:51,360 --> 00:28:53,240
Speaker 1: that are there on the asteroid to get a better

494
00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:56,600
Speaker 1: understanding of elements in the universe and bringing them back

495
00:28:56,640 --> 00:28:59,720
Speaker 1: to Earth, which, uh is a really cool idea. I

496
00:28:59,720 --> 00:29:03,440
Speaker 1: don't I don't imagine they would send people to do that. Um.

497
00:29:03,480 --> 00:29:07,960
Speaker 1: So the idea of doing the complex calculation necessary to

498
00:29:08,480 --> 00:29:12,040
Speaker 1: hit a moving object you know that's coming around, um,

499
00:29:12,240 --> 00:29:14,880
Speaker 1: take samples and then return to Earth. That's that's really

500
00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:18,280
Speaker 1: fascinating stuff. And that's not exactly the same topic, but

501
00:29:18,400 --> 00:29:22,040
Speaker 1: I think it's a really cool application of science and

502
00:29:22,120 --> 00:29:24,480
Speaker 1: hope that if they can do that that it will

503
00:29:24,520 --> 00:29:26,680
Speaker 1: be fruitful and we'll learn a lot from it. Yeah,

504
00:29:26,720 --> 00:29:29,680
Speaker 1: and asteroid mining may actually lead to other things as well, like,

505
00:29:29,720 --> 00:29:32,080
Speaker 1: for example, if we find an asteroid that has ice

506
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:35,160
Speaker 1: deposits on it, that could be a way of finding

507
00:29:35,160 --> 00:29:40,960
Speaker 1: not just water, but actually generating oxygen for other space missions.

508
00:29:41,160 --> 00:29:43,360
Speaker 1: So yeah, they're the asteroid mining is one of those

509
00:29:43,360 --> 00:29:45,520
Speaker 1: other things. We could probably do a full episode about

510
00:29:45,560 --> 00:29:47,720
Speaker 1: asteroid mining as well, just because there's so many other

511
00:29:48,320 --> 00:29:52,520
Speaker 1: possible applications for it that would be fun. Yep, I agree,

512
00:29:52,800 --> 00:29:55,680
Speaker 1: So let us wrap this one up. Guys. If you

513
00:29:55,720 --> 00:29:58,360
Speaker 1: have any topics you want us to cover, there's something

514
00:29:58,400 --> 00:30:00,680
Speaker 1: that's uh, it's got an ast right heading straight for

515
00:30:00,760 --> 00:30:03,000
Speaker 1: your brain, and you want us to nudge it all

516
00:30:03,040 --> 00:30:05,600
Speaker 1: the way. Let us know. You can send us a

517
00:30:05,640 --> 00:30:09,160
Speaker 1: message on email. The address is tech stuff at how

518
00:30:09,200 --> 00:30:10,920
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com, or you can let us know

519
00:30:11,000 --> 00:30:13,400
Speaker 1: on Facebook and Twitter are handled, there is tech stuff

520
00:30:13,600 --> 00:30:16,040
Speaker 1: hs W. Chris and I will talk to you again

521
00:30:16,560 --> 00:30:21,040
Speaker 1: really soon. Be sure to check out our new video

522
00:30:21,080 --> 00:30:24,480
Speaker 1: podcast stuff from the future. Join how Stuff Work staff

523
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