back to indexClara Sousa-Silva: Searching for Signs of Life on Venus and Other Planets | Lex Fridman Podcast #195
link |
The following is a conversation with Clara Sousa Silva, a quantum astrochemist at Harvard,
link |
specializing in spectroscopy of gases that serve as possible signs of life on other planets,
link |
most especially the gas phosphine. She was a coauthor of the paper that in 2020
link |
found that there is phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus and thus possible extraterrestrial life
link |
that lives in its atmosphere. The detection of phosphine was challenged, reaffirmed, and is now
link |
still under active research. Quick mention of our sponsors, Onit, Grammarly, Blinkist, and Indeed.
link |
Check them out in the description to support this podcast. As a side note, let me say that I think
link |
the search for life on other planets is one of the most important endeavors in science. If we
link |
find extraterrestrial life and study it, we may find insights into the mechanisms that originated
link |
life here on Earth, and more than life, the mechanisms that originated intelligence and
link |
consciousness. If we understand these mechanisms, we can build them. But more than this, the discovery
link |
of life on other planets means that our galaxy and our universe is teeming with life. This is
link |
humbling and terrifying, but it is also exciting. We humans are natural explorers. For most of our
link |
history, we explored the surface of the Earth and the contents of our minds. But now, with space
link |
faring vessels, we have a chance to explore life beyond Earth, their physics, their biology, and
link |
perhaps the contents of their minds. This is the Lux Friedman podcast, and here is my conversation
link |
with Clara Sousa Silva. Since you're the world expert in, well, in many things, but one of them
link |
is Phosphine, would it technically be correct to call you the Queen of Phosphine? I go for Dr.
link |
Phosphine. Queen is an inherited title, I feel. Yeah. But you still rule by love and power, so,
link |
but while having the doctor title. Yeah, kindness. Kindness, kindness. In September 2020,
link |
you coauthored a paper announcing possible presence of Phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus,
link |
and that it may be a signature of extraterrestrial life.
link |
Big maybe. Big maybe. There was some pushback, of course, from the scientific community that
link |
followed, friendly, loving pushback. Then in January, another paper from University of Wisconsin,
link |
I believe, confirmed the finding. Where do we stand in this saga, in this mystery of what the
link |
heck is going on on Venus in terms of Phosphine and in terms of aliens? Let's try to break it down.
link |
The short answer is we don't know. I think you and the rest of the public are now witnessing
link |
pretty exciting discovery, but as it evolves, as it unfolds, we did not wait until we had
link |
years of data from 10 different instruments across several layers of the atmosphere. We waited until
link |
we had two telescopes with independent data months apart. But still, the data is weak,
link |
it's noisy, it's delicate, it's very much at the edge of instrument sensibility, sensitivity.
link |
We still don't even know if it is Phosphine. We don't even really know if the signal is real.
link |
People still disagree about that. I think at the most morphological end of how this happened,
link |
I think it is a distinction, and myself and other coauthors were talking about this. It's a
link |
distinction between hypotheses generation and hypotheses testing. Now, hypothesis testing
link |
is something that I think is the backbone of the scientific method, but it has a problem, which is
link |
if you're looking through very noisy data and you want to test the hypotheses,
link |
you may, by mistake, create a superior signal. The safest, more conservative approach is hypothesis
link |
generation. You see some data and you go, what's in there? With no bias. Now, this is much safer,
link |
much more conservative, and when there's a lot of data, that's great. When there isn't, you can
link |
clean the noise and take out the signal with it, the signal with a bathwater, whatever the equivalent
link |
of the analogy would be. And so I think the healthy discourse that you described is exactly this.
link |
There are ways of processing the data completely legitimate ways, checked by multiple people and
link |
experts where the signal shows up, and then phosphine is in the atmosphere of Venus,
link |
and somewhere it doesn't. And then we disagree what that signal means. If it's real, and it is
link |
an ambiguously phosphine, it is very exciting because we don't know how to explain it without life,
link |
but going from there to venusians is still a huge jump.
link |
So that would be the title for the civilization if it is a living and thriving on Venus's venusians.
link |
Until we know what they call themselves. That's the name, yes.
link |
So this is the early analysis of early data. It was nevertheless,
link |
you waited until the actual peer reviewed publication?
link |
Of course. And analysis of the two different instruments months apart. So that's Alma and
link |
JCMT, the two telescopes. I mean, it's still, I mean, it's really exciting. What did it feel like
link |
sort of sitting on this data, like kind of anticipating the publication and wondering,
link |
and still wondering, is it true? How does it make you feel that a planet in our solar system
link |
might have phosphine in the atmosphere? It's nuts. It's absolutely nuts.
link |
In the best possible way. I've been working on phosphine for over a decade.
link |
Before it was cool. Before it was cool. Before anyone could spell it or heard of it. And at the
link |
time, people either didn't know what phosphine was or only knew it for being just possibly the most
link |
horrendous molecule that ever graced the earth. And so no one was a fan. And I'd been considering
link |
looking for it because I did think it was an unusual and disgusting, but very promising sign
link |
of life. I've been looking for it everywhere. I really didn't think to look in the solar system.
link |
I thought it was all pretty rough around here for life. And so I wasn't even considering
link |
the solar system at all and never my next door of Venus. It was only the lead author of the study,
link |
Jane Greaves, who thought to look in the clouds of Venus and then reached out to me to say,
link |
I don't know phosphine, but I know it's weird. How weird is it? And the answer is very weird.
link |
And so the telescopes we're looking at, this is visual data.
link |
That's what you mean by visual. You wouldn't see the phosphine.
link |
Well, but I mean, it's a telescope. It's remote. It's remote. You're observing,
link |
you're zooming in on this particular planet. I mean, what does the sensor actually look like?
link |
How many pixels are there? What does the data kind of look like? It'd be nice to kind of
link |
build up intuition of how little data we have based on which. I mean, if you look at like,
link |
I've just been reading a lot about gravitational waves and it's kind of incredible how from just
link |
very little, like probably the world's most precise instrument, we can derive some very
link |
foundational ideas about our early universe. And in that same way, it's kind of incredible
link |
how much data, how much information you can get from just a few pixels. So what are we talking
link |
about here in terms of based on which this paper saw possible signs of phosphine in the atmosphere?
link |
So phosphine like every other molecule has a unique spectroscopic fingerprint,
link |
meaning it rotates and vibrates in special ways. I calculated how many of those ways it can
link |
rotate and vibrate to the 16.8 billion ways. What this means is that if you look at the spectrum of
link |
light and that light has gone through phosphine gas on the other end, there should be 16.8 billion
link |
tiny marks left, indentations left in that spectrum. We found one of those on Venus,
link |
one of those 16.8 billion. So now the game is, can we find any of the other ones?
link |
But they're really hard to spot. They're all in terrible places in the electromagnetic spectrum
link |
and the instruments we use to find this one can't really find any other one. There's another one of
link |
the 16.8 billion we could find, but it would take many, many days of continuous observations.
link |
And that's not really in the cards right now. I mean, how do you, there's all kinds of noise,
link |
first of all. There's all kinds of other signal. So how do you separate all of that out to pull
link |
out just this particular signature that's associated with phosphine?
link |
So the data kind of looks somewhat like a wave and a lot of that is noise and it's a baseline.
link |
And so if you can figure out the exact shape of the wave, you can cancel that shape out and you
link |
should be left with a straight line and if there's something there, an absorption, so a signal.
link |
So that's what we did. We tried to find out what was this baseline shape,
link |
cleaned it out and got the signal. That's part of the problem. If you do this wrong,
link |
you can create a signal. But that signal is at 8.904 wave numbers and we actually have more digits
link |
than that, but I don't remember by heart. And ALMA in particular is a very, very good telescope,
link |
array of telescopes and it can focus on exactly that frequency. And in that frequency, there are
link |
only two known molecules that absorb at all. So that's how we do it. We look at that exact spot
link |
where we know phosphine absorbs. The other molecule is SO2.
link |
If there is extraterrestrial life, whether it's on Venus or on exoplanets where you looked before,
link |
how does that make you feel? How should it make us feel? Should we be scared? Should we be excited?
link |
Let's say it's not intelligent life. Let's say it's microbial life. Is there a threat to us?
link |
Are we a threat to it? Or is it only, not only, but mostly a possibility to understand something
link |
fundamental, something beautiful about life in the universe?
link |
Hard to know. You would have to bring on a poet or a philosopher on the show.
link |
So I feel those things. I just don't know if those are the right things to feel.
link |
I certainly don't feel scared. I think it's rather silly to feel scared. Definitely don't
link |
touch them sometimes in the movies. Don't go near it. Don't interfere. I think one of the things
link |
with Venus is because of phosphine, now there is a chance that Venus is inhabited. In that case,
link |
we shouldn't go there. We should be very careful with messing with them, bringing our own stuff
link |
there that contaminates it. Venus has suffered enough. If there's life there, it's probably the
link |
remains of a living planet, the very last survivors of what once was potentially a thriving world.
link |
And so I don't want our first interaction with alien life to be massacre. So I definitely wouldn't
link |
want to go near out of a, let's say, galactic responsibility, galactic ethics. And I often
link |
think of alien astronomers watching us and how disappointed they would be if we messed this
link |
up. So I really want to be very careful with anything that could be life. But certainly,
link |
I wouldn't be scared. Humans are plenty capable of killing one another. We don't need extraterrestrial
link |
help to destroy ourselves. Scared mostly of other humans. Exactly. But this life, if there
link |
is life there, it does seem just like you said, it would be pretty rugged. It's like the cockroaches
link |
or Chuck Norris, I don't know. It's something that survived through some very difficult conditions.
link |
That doesn't mean it would handle us. It could be like war of the worlds.
link |
You come just because you're resilient in your own planet doesn't mean you can survive another.
link |
Even our extremophiles, which are very impressive, we should all be very proud of our extremophiles,
link |
they wouldn't really make it in the Venusian clouds. So I wouldn't expect, because you're tough,
link |
even Chuck Norris tough, that you would survive on a alien planet.
link |
And then from the scientific perspective, you don't want to pollute the data gathering process,
link |
but it should be showing up there. The observer can affect the observed.
link |
How heartbreaking would it be if we found life on another planet and then we're like,
link |
oh, we brought it with us. So this is my sandwich.
link |
But that's always the problem, right? And it's certainly a problem with Mars,
link |
because we visited that if there is life on Mars or like remains of life on Mars,
link |
it's always going to be a question of like, well, maybe we planted it there.
link |
Let's not do the same with Venus. It's harder because when we try to go to Venus,
link |
and things melt very quickly. And so it's a little harder to pollute Venus.
link |
It's very good at destroying foreigners.
link |
Yeah. Well, in terms of Elon Musk and terraforming planets, Mars is stop number one,
link |
and Venus maybe after that. So can we talk about Phosphine a little bit?
link |
What's your Twitter handle that's like Dr. Phosphine?
link |
It's Dr. Phosphine, yes. You'll be surprised here. It wasn't taken already. I could just,
link |
I just grabbed it. Didn't have to buy it off anyone.
link |
Yeah. So what is it? What's Phosphine? You already mentioned it's pretty toxic and
link |
troublesome. And outside, troublesome, sorry.
link |
No, I love it. I'm going to start calling it troublesome.
link |
So maybe what are some things that make it interesting chemically, and why is it a good sign
link |
of life when it's present in the atmosphere? Like you've described in your paper aptly titled
link |
the Phosphine as a biosignature gas in exoplanet atmospheres. I suppose you wrote that paper
link |
I did. Yes, I did. And no one cared. In that paper, I said something like,
link |
if we find Phosphine on any terrestrial planet, it can only mean life. And I was like,
link |
yeah, that sounds about right. Let's go. And then Venus shows up and I was like,
link |
are you sure? I was sure before I was sure. Now that it's right here, I'm less sure
link |
now that my claims are being tested. So Phosphine. Phosphine is a fascinating molecule. So it's
link |
shaped like a pyramid with a phosphorus up top and then three hydrogens. It's actually quite a
link |
simple molecule in many ways. It's the most popular elements in the universe, carbon, hydrogen,
link |
nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, sulfur. When you add hydrogen to them, it makes quite simple,
link |
quite famous molecules. You do it to oxygen, you get water. You do it to carbon, you get methane.
link |
You do it to nitrogen, you get ammonia. These are all molecules people have heard of.
link |
But you do it to phosphorus, you get Phosphine. People haven't heard of Phosphine because
link |
it's not really popular on Earth. We really shouldn't find it anywhere on Earth because
link |
it is extremely toxic to life. It interacts with oxygen metabolism and everything you know
link |
and love uses oxygen metabolism. And it interacts fatally, so it kills in several very imaginative
link |
and very macabre ways. So it was used as a chemical warfare agent in the First World War and most
link |
recently by ISIS. So really bad. Most life avoids it. Even life that might not avoid it, so life that
link |
doesn't use oxygen metabolism, anaerobic life, still has to put crazy amounts of effort into
link |
making it. It's a really difficult molecule to make thermodynamically speaking. It's really
link |
difficult to make that phosphorus want to be together with that hydrogen. So it's horrible.
link |
Everyone avoids it. When they're not avoiding it, it's extremely difficult to make. You would
link |
have to put energy in, sacrifice energy to make it. And if you did go through all that trouble
link |
and made it, it gets reacted with the radicals in the atmosphere and gets destroyed. So we
link |
shouldn't find it anywhere and yet we do. It's this kind of weird molecule that seems to
link |
be made by life and we don't even know why. Life clearly finds a use for it. It's not the only
link |
molecule that life is willing to sacrifice energy to make, but we don't know how or why life is
link |
even making it. So absolutely mysterious, absolutely deadly, smells horrifically when it's
link |
made. It produces other kind of diphosphines and it's been reported as smelling like garlicky
link |
fishy death. Once someone referred to it as smelling like the, let me see if I remember,
link |
the rancid diapers of the spawn of Satan. Oh, very nice. Yeah, very, very vivid.
link |
And so you're a poet after all. I didn't call that someone else did. And so it's just this
link |
horrific molecule, but it is produced by life. We don't know why. And when it is produced by life
link |
is done with enormous sacrifice and the universe does not sacrifice. Life sacrifices. And so it's
link |
this strange contradictory molecule that we should all be avoiding and yet seems to be an almost
link |
unambiguous sign of life on rocky planets. Okay. Can we dig into that a little bit? So on rocky
link |
planets, what, is there biological mechanisms that can produce it? And is there, you said that
link |
why is unclear? Why life might produce it? But is there an understanding of what kind of mechanisms
link |
might be able to produce it? This very difficult to produce molecule? We don't know yet. The enzymatic
link |
pathways of phosphine production by life are not yet known. This is not actually as surprising
link |
as it might sound. I think something like 80% of all the natural products that we know of,
link |
so we know biology makes them. We don't know how. It is much easier to know life produces
link |
something because you can put bacteria in a Petri dish and then watch and then that gas is produced
link |
to go, oh, life made it. That actually happened with phosphine. But that's much easier to do,
link |
of course, than figuring out what is the exact metabolic pathway within that life form that
link |
created this molecule. So we don't know yet. Phosphine is really understudied. No one had
link |
really heard of it until nowish. What you were presenting is the fact that life produces
link |
phosphine, not the process by which it produces phosphine. Is there an urgency now? If you were
link |
to try to understand the mechanisms, the enzymatic pathways that produce phosphine, how difficult
link |
is that of a problem to crack? It's really difficult. If I'm not mistaken, even the scent of truffles,
link |
obviously a billion dollar industry, huge deal. Until quite recently, it wasn't known exactly
link |
how those scents, those molecules that create this incredible smell were produced. This is
link |
a billion dollar industry. As you can imagine, there is no such pressure. There's no phosphine
link |
lobby or anything that would push for this research. But I hope someone picks it up and
link |
does it. And it isn't crazy because we know that phosphine is really hard to make. We know it's
link |
really hard for it to happen accidentally, even lightning and volcanoes that can produce small
link |
amounts of phosphine. It's extremely difficult for even these extreme processes to make it.
link |
So it's not really surprising that only life can do it because life is willing to make things
link |
at a cost. So maybe on the topic of phosphine, again, you've gotten yourself into trouble that
link |
I'm going to ask all these high level poetic questions. I apologize. No, I would love it.
link |
Okay. When did you first fall in love with phosphine? It wasn't love at first sight. It was
link |
somewhere between a long relationship and Stockholm syndrome. When I first started by PhD,
link |
I knew I wanted to learn about molecular spectra and how to simulate it. I thought it was really
link |
outrageous that we as a species couldn't detect molecules remotely. We didn't have this perfect
link |
catalog ready of the molecular fingerprint of every molecule we may want to find in the universe.
link |
And something as basic as phosphine, the fact that we didn't really know how it interacted with light
link |
and so we couldn't detect it properly in the galaxy, just I was so indignant. And so initially,
link |
I just started working on phosphine because people hadn't before and I thought we should
link |
know what phosphine looks like. And that was it. And then I read every paper that's ever been
link |
published about phosphine. It was quite easy because there aren't that many. And that's when I
link |
started learning about where we had already found it in the universe and what it meant.
link |
I started finding out quite how little we know about it and why. And it was only when I joined
link |
MIT and I started talking to biochemists that it became clear that phosphine wasn't just weird
link |
and special and understudied and disgusting. It was all these things for oxygen loving life.
link |
And it was the anaerobic world that would welcome phosphine. And that's when the idea of
link |
looking for it on other planets became crystallized because oxygen is very powerful and very important
link |
on Earth. But that's not necessarily going to be the case on other exoplanets. Most planets are
link |
oxygen pole. Overwhelmingly, most planets are oxygen pole. And so finding the sign of life
link |
that would be welcomed by everything that would live without oxygen on Earth seemed so cool.
link |
And but ultimately, the project at first was born out of the idea that you want to find that
link |
molecular fingerprint of any of a molecule. And this is just one example. And that's connected
link |
to then looking for that fingerprint elsewhere in a remote way. And obviously that then
link |
at that time where exoplanets already, when you were doing your PhD, and by the way,
link |
should say your PhD thesis was on phosphine. It was all on phosphine, 100% on phosphine.
link |
With a little bit of ammonia, I have a chapter that I did where I talked about
link |
phosphine and ammonia. But no, phosphine was very much my thesis.
link |
But at that time, when you're writing it, there's already a sense that exoplanets are out there.
link |
And we might be able to be looking for biosignatures on those exoplanets.
link |
Pretty much. So I finished my PhD in 2015. We found the first exoplanets in the kind
link |
of mid to late 90s. So exoplanets were known. It was known that some had atmospheres.
link |
And from there, it's not a big jump to think, well, if some have atmospheres,
link |
some of those might be habitable. And some of those may be inhabited.
link |
So how do you detect, you started to talk about it, but can we linger on it? How do you detect
link |
phosphine on a faraway thing, rocky thing, rocky planet? What is spectroscopy?
link |
What is this molecular fingerprint? What does it look like? You've kind of mentioned a wave,
link |
but what are we supposed to think about? What are the tools? What are the uncertainties?
link |
All those kinds of things. So the path can go this way. You've got light,
link |
kind of pure light. You can crack that light open with a prism or a spectroscope or water
link |
and make a rainbow. That rainbow is all the colors and all the invisible colors,
link |
the ultraviolet, the infrared. And if that light was truly pure, you could consider that rainbow
link |
to just cover continuously all of these colors. But if that light goes through a gas, we may not
link |
see that gas. We certainly cannot see the molecules within that gas. But those molecules will steal,
link |
absorb some of that light, some, but not all. Each molecule absorbs only very specific colors of
link |
that rainbow. And so if you know, for example, that shade of green can only be absorbed by methane,
link |
then you can watch. As a planet passes in front of a star, the planet's too far away,
link |
you can't see it. And it has an atmosphere. That atmosphere is far too small, you definitely
link |
can't see it. But the sunlight will go through that atmosphere. And if that atmosphere is methane,
link |
then on the other side, that shade of blue, I can't remember if I said blue or green,
link |
for that color will be missing because methane took it. And so with phosphine, it's the same thing.
link |
It has specific colors, 16.8 billion colors, that it absorbs it and nothing else does.
link |
And so if you can find them and notice them missing from the light of a star that went
link |
through a planet's atmosphere, then you'll know that atmosphere contains their molecule. How cool
link |
is that? That's incredible. So you can have this fingerprint within the space of colors,
link |
and there's a lot of molecules. And I mean, I wonder, that's a question of how much overlap
link |
there is. How close can you get to the actual fingerprint? Can phosphine unlock the iPhone
link |
with its lights on? It says 16.8 billion. So presumably this rainbow is discretized into
link |
little segments somehow. How many total are there? How a lot is 16.8 billion?
link |
It's a lot. We don't have the instruments to break these, break any light into this many
link |
tiny segments. And so with the instruments we do have, there's huge amounts of overlap.
link |
Methane is an example. A lot of the ways it's detectable is because the carbon and the hydrogens,
link |
they vibrate with one another, they move, they interact. But every other hydrocarbon,
link |
acetylene, isoprene, has carbon and hydrogens, also vibrating and rotating. And so it's actually
link |
very hard to tell them apart at low resolutions. And our instruments can't really cope with
link |
distinguishing between molecules particularly well. But in an ideal world, if we had infinite
link |
resolution, then yes, every molecule's spectral features will be unique.
link |
Yeah, almost too unique. It would be too trivial.
link |
At the quantum level, they're unique. At our level, there's huge overlap.
link |
Yeah. But then you can start to then try to disambiguate the fact that certain
link |
colors are missing. What does that mean? And hopefully, they're missing in a certain kind
link |
of pattern where you can say, was some kind of probability that it's this gas, not this gas.
link |
So you're solving that gaseous puzzle. I got it. Okay.
link |
We can go back to Venus actually and show that. So with this, I mentioned those two molecules
link |
that could be responsible for that signal, the resolution that we have. It was phosphine and
link |
SO2, sulfur dioxide. And that resolution could really be one of the other. But in that same
link |
bandwidth, so in kind of the same observations, there was another region where phosphine does
link |
not absorb. We know that. But SO2 does. So we just went unchecked and there was no signal.
link |
So we thought, oh, then it must be phosphine. And then we submitted the paper.
link |
The rest is history. I got it. Well, yeah, that's beautifully told.
link |
Is there, so the telescopes we're talking about are sitting on Earth. What can it help solving
link |
this fingerprint molecular fingerprint problem if we do a flyby? Does it help if you get closer
link |
and closer? Or are telescopes pretty damn good for this kind of puzzle solving?
link |
Telescopes are pretty good, but the Earth's atmosphere is a pain. I mean, I'm very thankful
link |
for it. But it does interrupt a lot of measurements and a lot of regions where
link |
phosphine would be active. They are not available. The Earth is not transparent in those wavelengths.
link |
So being above the atmosphere would make a huge difference. Then proximity matters a lot less.
link |
But just escaping the Earth's atmosphere would be wonderful. But then it's really hard to stay
link |
very stable. And if there is phosphine on Venus, there's very little of it in the clouds. And so
link |
the signal is very weak. And the telescopes we can use on Earth are much bigger and much more
link |
stable. So it's a bit of a trade off. So is it, are you comfortable with this kind of remote
link |
observation? Is it at all helpful to strive for going over to Venus and like grabbing a scoop
link |
of the atmosphere? Or is remote observation really a powerful tool for this kind of job?
link |
Like the scoop is not necessary? Well, a lot of people want to scoop. I get it.
link |
I get it completely. That's my natural inclination, yeah.
link |
I don't want to scoop specifically because if it is life, I want to know everything I can
link |
and remotely before I interfere. So that's my, I've got ethical reasons against the scoop,
link |
more than engineering reasons against the scoop. But I have some engineering
link |
reasons against the scoop. Scoop is not a technical term, but I feel like now it's too late.
link |
Thank you for going along with this. It's too late to take it back.
link |
We don't understand the clouds well enough to plan the scoop very well.
link |
Because it's not that saturated, like there's not that much of it present.
link |
No, and the place is nasty. It's not going to be easy to build something that can do the task
link |
reliably and can be trusted. The measurements can be trusted and then pass that message on.
link |
So actually, I'm for an orbiter. I think we should have orbiters around every solar system body,
link |
whose job is just to learn about these places. I'm disappointed we haven't already got an orbiter
link |
around every single one of them. It's small. It can be a small satellite,
link |
splitting data, figuring out, you know, how do the clouds move? What's in them?
link |
How often is there lightning and volcanic activity? Where's the topography? Is it changing?
link |
Is there a biosphere actively doing things? We should be monitoring this from afar.
link |
And so I'm for over the atmosphere, hopefully around Venus. That would be my choice.
link |
Okay. So now recently, Venus is all exciting about phosphine and everything. Is there other stuff
link |
maybe before we were looking at Venus or now looking out into other solar systems? Is there
link |
other promising exoplanets or other planets within the solar system that might have phosphine
link |
or might have other strong biosignatures that we should be looking for like phosphine?
link |
There's a few, but outside the solar system, all our promising candidates, we know so little
link |
about them. For most of them, we barely know their density. Most of them, we don't even know if they
link |
have an atmosphere. Never mind what that atmosphere might contain. So we're still very much at the
link |
stage where we have detected promising planets, but they're promising in that they're about the
link |
right size, about the right density, they could have an atmosphere, and they're about the right
link |
distance from their host star. But that's really all we know. Near future telescopes will tell us
link |
much more, but for now, we're just guessing. So you said near future. So there's hope that
link |
there'll be telescopes that can see that far enough to determine if there's an atmosphere and
link |
perhaps even the contents of that atmosphere? Absolutely. JWST, launching later this year,
link |
will be able to get a very rough sense of the main atmospheric constituents of planets
link |
that could potentially be habitable. And that's this year. What's the name? JWST, the James Webb
link |
Space Telescope. Okay. And that's going to be out in space past the atmosphere? Yes. Is there
link |
something interesting to be said about the engineering aspect of the telescope?
link |
That's an incredible beast, but it's a beast of many burdens. So what it's going to do,
link |
it's good. See, you are a poet. You're, yeah, I love it. This is very eloquent. You're speaking
link |
to the audience, which I appreciate. So yeah, so it's a giant engineering project. And
link |
is it orbiting something? Do you know? So it's going to be above the atmosphere. And it will be
link |
doing lots of different astrophysics. And so some of its time will be dedicated to exoplanets.
link |
But there's an entire astronomy field fighting for time before the cryogenic lifetime of the
link |
instrument. And so when I was looking for the possibility of finding phosphine on distant
link |
exoplanets, I used JWST as a way of checking with this instrument that we will launch later this
link |
year. Could we detect phosphine on an oxygen poor planet? And there I put very much a hard stop where
link |
some of my simulations said, yes, you can totally do it, but it will take a little under the cryogenic
link |
lifetime of this machine. So then I had to go, well, that's not going to, no one's going to
link |
dedicate all of JWST to look for my molecule that no one cared about. So we're very much at that edge.
link |
But there'll be many other telescopes in the coming decades that will be able to tell us
link |
quite a lot about the atmospheres of potentially habitable planets.
link |
So you mentioned a simulation. This is super interesting to me. And this perhaps could be
link |
a super dumb question, but I'm going to prove you wrong on that one. You simulate molecules to
link |
understand how they look from a distance is what I understand. Like, what does that simulation
link |
look like? So it's talking about which colors that the rainbow will be missing. Is that the
link |
goal of the simulation? That's a goal, but it's really just a very, very nasty Schrodinger's
link |
equation. So it's a quantum simulation. Also, it's simulating at the quantum level.
link |
Yes. So I'm a quantum astrochemist. Hi, I'm Clara. I'm a quantum astrochemist.
link |
That's how we should have started this conversation. Can you describe the three components of that
link |
quantum astro and chemist and how they interplay together?
link |
So I study the quantum behavior of molecules, hence the quantum and the chemist,
link |
specifically so I can detect them in space and see astro. So what I do is I figure out the
link |
probability of a molecule being in a particular state. There's no deterministic nature to the
link |
work I do. So every transition is just a likelihood. But if you get a population of that molecule,
link |
it will always happen. And so this is all of the quantum level. It's a Schrodinger equation on,
link |
I think, 27 dimensions. I don't remember it by heart. And what this means is I'm solving these
link |
giant quantum matrices. And that's why you need a lot of computer power, giant computers,
link |
to diagonalize these enormous matrices, each of whom describes a single vibrational behavior of
link |
a molecule. So I think phosphine has 17.5 million possible states it can exist in.
link |
And transitions can occur between pairs of these states. And there's a certain likelihood that
link |
they'll happen. This is the quantum world. Nothing is deterministic. There's just a likelihood
link |
that it'll jump from one state to another. And these jumps, they're transitions,
link |
and there's 16.8 billion of them. When energy is absorbed, that corresponds to this transition,
link |
we see it in the spectrum. This is more quantum chemistry than you had asked for, I'm sorry.
link |
No, no, I'm sorry. Brain's broken. So when the transitions happen between the different states,
link |
somehow the energy maps the spectrum. Exactly. Energy corresponds to a frequency,
link |
and a frequency corresponds to a wavelength, which corresponds to a color.
link |
So there's some probability assigned to each color then?
link |
Exactly. And that probability determines how intense that transition will be, how strong.
link |
And so you run this kind of simulation for particular, so that's 17.5 square or something
link |
like that. Exactly. 17.5 million energies, each one of whom involves diagonalizing a giant matrix
link |
with a supercomputer. Which I wonder what the most efficient algorithm for diagonalization is.
link |
But there's some kind of... There's many.
link |
Depends on kind of the shape of the matrix. So they're not random matrices. So some are more
link |
diagonal than others. And so some need more treatment than others. Most of the work ends up
link |
going in describing this system, this quantum system, in different ways until you have a matrix
link |
that is close to being diagonal. And then it's much easier to clean it up.
link |
So how hard is this puzzle? So you're solving this puzzle for phosphine, right?
link |
Is this... Are we supposed to solve this puzzle for every single molecule?
link |
Oh boy. Yes, I calculated if I did the work I did for phosphine, again, for all the molecules for
link |
which we don't have spectra, for which we don't have a fingerprint, it would take me 62,000 years.
link |
A little over. 62,000 years. What time flies when you're having fun? Okay. But you write that
link |
there are about 16,000 molecules we care about when looking for a new Earth or when we try to detect
link |
alien biosignatures. If we want to detect any molecules from here, we need to know their spectra
link |
and we currently don't. Solving this particular problem, that's my job.
link |
What was that? I mean, that's absolutely correct. I could have not said it better myself. Did you
link |
take that from my website? Yeah, I think I stole it. And your website is excellent. So it's worthy
link |
place to steal stuff from. Thank you. How do you solve this problem for the 16,000 molecules we care
link |
about, of which phosphine is one? Yes. And so taking a step a little bit out of phosphine,
link |
is there... But we were having so much fun. We were having so much fun. No, we're not saying...
link |
No, no, no, I... It's sticking around. I'm just saying we're joining more friends coming to the
link |
party. How do you choose other friends to come to the party that are interesting to study as we
link |
solve one puzzle at a time through the space of 16,000? So we've already started. Out of those 16,000,
link |
we understand water quite well, methane quite well, ammonia quite well, carbon dioxide.
link |
I could keep going. And then we understand molecules like acetylene, hydrogen cyanide,
link |
more or less. And that takes us to about 4% of those 16,000. We understand about 4% of them,
link |
more or less. Phosphine is one of them. But the other 96%, we just really have barely any idea
link |
at all of where in the spectrum of light they would leave a mark. I can't spend the next 62,000
link |
years doing this work. And I don't want to, even if somehow I was able, that wouldn't feel good.
link |
So one of the things that I try to do now is move away from how I did phosphine. So I did
link |
phosphine really the best that I could, the best that could be done with the computer power that
link |
we have, trying to get each one of those 16.8 billion transitions mapped accurately calculated.
link |
And then I thought, what if I do a worse job? What if I just do a much worse job?
link |
Can I just make it much faster and then it's still worth it? How bad can I get
link |
before it's worthless? And then could I do this for all the other molecules? So I created exactly
link |
this terrible, terrible system. So what's the answer to that question,
link |
that fundamental question I ask myself all the time in other domains?
link |
How crappy can I be before I'm useless? Before somebody notices.
link |
Turns out pretty crappy because no one has any idea what these molecules look like.
link |
Anything is better than nothing. And so I thought, how long will it take me to create
link |
better than nothing spectra for all of these molecules? And so I created rascal, rapid,
link |
approximate spectral calculations for all. And what I do is I use organic chemistry and
link |
quantum chemistry and kind of cheat them both. I just tried to figure out what is the fastest
link |
way I could run this. And I simulate rough spectra for all of those 16,000. So I've
link |
managed to get it to work. It's really shocking how well it works considering how bad it is.
link |
Is there insights you could give to the tricks involved in making it fast? Like what are the
link |
maybe some insightful shortcuts taken that still result in some useful information about the spectra?
link |
The insights came from organic chemistry from decades ago. When organic chemists wanted to
link |
know what a compound might be, they would look at a spectrum and see a feature and they would go,
link |
hmm, I've seen that feature before. That's usually what happens when you have a carbon
link |
triple bonded to another carbon. And they were mostly right. Almost every molecule that has a
link |
carbon triple bonded to another one looks like that. Has other features different from that
link |
distinguish them from one another, but they have that feature in common. We call these functional
link |
groups. And so most of that work ended up being abandoned because now we have mass spectrometry,
link |
we've got nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. So people don't really need to do that anymore.
link |
But these ancient textbooks still exist. And I've collected them all as many as I could.
link |
And there are hundreds of these descriptions where people have said, oh, whenever you have
link |
iodine atom connected to this one, there's always a feature here. And it's usually quite sharp.
link |
And it's quite strong. And some people go, oh, yeah, that's a really broad feature every time
link |
that combination of atoms and bonds. So I've collected them all. And I've created this giant
link |
dictionary of all these kind of puzzle pieces, these Lego parts of molecules. And I've written a
link |
code that then puts them all together in some kind of like Frankenstein's monster of molecules.
link |
So you ask me for any molecule and I go, well, it has these bonds and this atom dangling off this
link |
atom and this cluster here. And I tell you what it should look like. And it kind of works.
link |
So this creates a whole portfolio of just kind of signatures that we could look for.
link |
Rough, very rough signatures. But still useful enough to analyze the atmospheres,
link |
the telescope generated images of other planets.
link |
Close. Right now, it is so complete. So it has all of these molecules that I can tell you,
link |
say you look at an alien atmosphere and there's a feature there. It can tell you, oh,
link |
that feature, that's familiar. It could be one of these 816 molecules. Best of luck.
link |
Yes. So I think the next step, which is what I'm working on is telling you something
link |
more useful than it could be one of those 816 molecules. That's still true. I wouldn't say
link |
it's useful. So it can tell you, but only 12% of them also have a feature in this region. So
link |
go look there. And if there's nothing there, it can't be those and so on. It can also tell you
link |
things like you will need this much accuracy to distinguish between those 816. So that's
link |
what I'm working on. But it's a lot of work. So this is really interesting, the role of computing
link |
in this whole picture, emission code. So you as a quantum astrochemist, there is some role for
link |
programming in your life, in your past life, in your current life, in your group. Oh yeah,
link |
almost entirely. I'm a computational quantum astrochemist, but that doesn't roll off the tongue
link |
very easily. So this is fundamentally computational. If you want to be successful in the 21st century
link |
and doing quantum astrochemistry, you want to be computational? Absolutely. All quantum chemistry
link |
is computational at this point. Okay. Does machine learning play a role at all? Is there some
link |
extra shortcuts that could be discovered through like, you see all that success with protein
link |
folding, right? A problem that thought to be extremely difficult to apply machine learning to
link |
because it's mostly because there's not a lot of already solved puzzles to train on. I suppose
link |
the same exact thing is true with this particular problem, but is there hope for machine learning
link |
to help out? Absolutely. Currently, you've laid out exactly the problem. The training set is
link |
awful. And because there's so, a lot of the data that I'm basing it on is literally many
link |
decades old. The people who worked on it and the data that I get, often they're dead. And
link |
the files that I've used, some of them were hand drawn by someone tired in the 70s.
link |
So I could of course have a program training on these, but I would just be perpetuating
link |
these mistakes without hope of actually verifying them. So my next step is to improve this training
link |
set by hand and then try to see if I can apply machine learning on the full code and the full
link |
16,000 molecules and improve them all. But really, I need to be able to test the outcomes with
link |
experimental data, which means convincing someone in a lab to spend a lot of money putting very
link |
dangerous gases in chambers and measuring them at outrageous temperatures. So it's a work in
link |
progress. And so collecting huge amounts of data about the actual gases. So you're up for doing
link |
that kind of thing too. So actually, like doing the full end to end thing, which is like having
link |
a gas collecting data about it, and then doing the kind of analysis that creates the fingerprint,
link |
and then also analyzing using that library, the data that comes from other planets. So you do the
link |
full full from birth to death. Yes, I worked in an industrial chemistry laboratory when I was
link |
much younger in Slovenia. And there I worked in the lab actually collecting spectra and
link |
predicting spectra. What's it like to work with a bunch of gases that are like not so human friendly?
link |
It's fine. It's horrific. It's so scary. And I love my job. I'm willing to clearly sacrifice a lot
link |
for it, job stability, money, sanity. But I only worked there for a few months. It was really
link |
terrifying. There's just so many ways to die. Usually you only have a handful of ways to die
link |
every day. But if you work in a lab, there's so many more, orders of magnitude more. And I was
link |
very bad at it. I'm not a good hands on scientist. I want a laptop connected to a remote supercomputer
link |
or a laptop connected to a telescope. I don't need to be there to believe it. And I am not good
link |
in the lab. Yeah, when there's a bunch of things that can poison you, a bunch of things that could
link |
explode and they're gaseous and they're often maybe they might not even have a smell or they
link |
might not be visible. So many of them give you cancer. It's just so cruel. And some people love
link |
this work, but I've never enjoyed experimental work. It's so ungrateful. It's so lonely.
link |
Well, most, I mean, so much work is lonely if you find the joy in it. But you enjoy the results of
link |
it. Yes. I'm very thankful for all the experimentalists in my life. But I'll do the theory. They do
link |
the experiment and then we talked one another and make sure it matches. Okay, beautiful.
link |
What are spectroscopic networks? Those look super cool. Are they related to what we were talking
link |
about? The picture looked pretty. Oh, yes, slightly. So remember when I mentioned the 17.5
link |
million energy levels? Yes. There are rules for each molecule on which energy levels they can jump
link |
from and to and how likely it is to make that jump. And so if you plot all the routes it can take,
link |
you get this energy network for which is like a ball. So these are the constraints of the
link |
transitions that could be taken. Exactly for each molecule. Interesting. And no, they're not,
link |
so it's not a fully connected. It's like, it's sparse somehow. Yes, you get islands sometimes.
link |
You get a molecule can only jump from one set of states to another and it's trapped now in this
link |
network. It can never go to another network that could have been available to other siblings.
link |
Is there some insight to be drawn from these networks? Like something cool that you can
link |
understand about a particular molecule because of it? Yes, some molecules have what we call forbidden
link |
transitions, which aren't really forbidden because it's quantum. There are no rules. No,
link |
there are rules. It's just the rules are very often broken in the quantum world. And so forbidden
link |
transitions doesn't actually mean they're forbidden. Low probability. Exactly. They just
link |
become deeply unlikely. Yeah, cool. And then so you could do all the same, like coming from a
link |
computer science world, you know, I love graph theory. So you can do all the same like graph
link |
theoretic kind of analysis of like clusters or something like that or all those kinds of things
link |
and draw insights from it. And they're unique for each molecule. So the networks that you mentioned,
link |
that's actually not too difficult a layer of quantum physics. By then all the energies are
link |
mapped. So we've had high school children work on those networks. And the trick is to not tell them
link |
they're doing quantum physics until like three months in when it's too late for them to back out.
link |
And then you're like, you're a quantum physicist now and it's really nice.
link |
Yeah. Okay. But like the promise of this, even though it's $16,000, even just a subset of them,
link |
that's really exciting. Because then you can do as the telescope day to get better and better,
link |
especially for exoplanets, but also for Venus, you can then start like getting your full like,
link |
you know, how you get like bloodwork done or like you get your genetic testing to see what your
link |
ancestors are, you can get the same kind of like high resolution information about interesting
link |
things going on on a particular planet based on the atmosphere, right? Exactly. How cool would
link |
that be if we could, you know, scan an alien planet and go, oh, this is what the clouds are made of.
link |
This is what's in the surface. These are the molecules that are mixing. Here are probably
link |
oceans because you can see these types of molecules above it. And here are the Hadley cells. Here are
link |
how the biosphere works. We could map this whole thing.
link |
Wouldn't it be cool if the aliens like are aware of these techniques and like would spoof
link |
like the wrong gases just to like pretend that's how they can be. It's like an invisibility cloak.
link |
They can generate gases that would throw you off or like, or do the opposite. They pretend they
link |
would artificially generate phosphine. So like, like the dumb, the dumb apes on earth again,
link |
like go out like flying in different places because it's just fun. It's like some teenager alien
link |
somewhere just pranking. Yeah. I was asked that exact question this Saturday by a seven year old
link |
boy in Canada. Oh, seven? Yes. But it was the first time I'd been asked that question this
link |
the second in a week. Were kindred spirits him and I? We can. They can prank us to some extent,
link |
but the this work of interpreting an alien atmosphere means you're reading the atmosphere
link |
as a message. And it's very hard to hide signs of life in an atmosphere because
link |
you can try to prank us, but you're still going to fart and breathe and somehow metabolize the
link |
environment around you and call that whatever you call that and release molecules. And so that's
link |
really hard to hide. You know, you can go very quiet. You can throw out some weird molecule to
link |
confuse us further, but we can still see all your other metabolites. It's hard to fake. Is there,
link |
so you kind of mentioned like water, what other gases are there that we know about that are like
link |
high likelihood as biosignatures in terms of life? I mean, what are your other favorites?
link |
So we've got phosphine, but what else is a damn good signal to be that you think about that we
link |
should be looking for if we look at another atmosphere? Is there gases that come to mind or
link |
are there all sort of possible biosignatures that we should love equally? There's many,
link |
so there's water. We know that's important for life as we know it. There's molecular oxygen
link |
on earth. That's probably the most robust sign of life, particularly combined with small amounts
link |
of methane. And it's true that the majority of the oxygen and atmosphere is a product of life.
link |
And so if I was an alien astronomer and I saw Earth's atmosphere, I would get a Nobel, I think.
link |
What would you notice? I mean, this is really... I would be very excited about this.
link |
About the oxygen. About 20%, 21% of oxygen atmosphere. That's very unusual.
link |
So would that be the most exciting thing to you from an alien perspective about Earth
link |
in terms of analyzing the atmosphere? What are the biosignatures of life on earth,
link |
would you say, in terms of the contents of the atmosphere? Is oxygen high amount of oxygen
link |
pretty damn good sign? I mean, it's not as good as the TV signals we've been sending out. Those
link |
are slightly more robust than oxygen. Oxygen on its own has false positives for life,
link |
so there's still ways of making it. But it's a pretty robust sign of life in the context of
link |
atmosphere with the radiation that the sun produces, our position in relation to the sun,
link |
the other components of our atmosphere, the volcanic activity we have, all of that together
link |
makes the 20% of oxygen extremely robust sign of life. But outside that context,
link |
you could still produce oxygen without life. But phosphine, although better in the sense of
link |
it is much harder to make, it has lower false positives, still has some. So I'm actually
link |
against looking for specific molecules unless we're looking for like CFCs. If we find CFCs,
link |
that's definitely aliens. I feel confident chlorofluorocarbons. And so if aliens had been
link |
watching us, they would have been going, oh no, CFCs, I mean, they're not going to last long.
link |
Let's see, everyone's writing their thesis on the end of the earth. And then we got together,
link |
we stopped using them. I like to think they're really proud of us. They literally saw our ozone
link |
hull shrinking. They've been watching it and they saw it happen. I think to be honest,
link |
they're more paying attention to the whole nuclear thing. I don't think they care,
link |
it's not going to bother them. Oh, I mean, worried about us. Oh, yes. No, worried about us.
link |
They, I mean, this is why the aliens have been showing up recently. It's like, if you look at,
link |
I mean, there is interest, I mean, it's probably there's a correlation with a lot of things. But
link |
what the ufologists, quote unquote, often talk about is that there seems to be a much higher
link |
level of UFO sightings since like in the nuclear age. So like if aliens were indeed worried about
link |
us, like if you were aliens, you would start showing up when the living organisms have first
link |
discovered a way to destroy the entire colony. Couldn't the increase in sightings not have to
link |
do with the fact that people now have more cameras? It's an interesting thing about science. Like
link |
with UFO sightings, it's like either 99.9% of them are false or 100% of them are false. The
link |
interesting thing to me is that in that 0.01%, there's a lot of things in science that are like
link |
these weird outliers, they're difficult to replicate. You have like, there's even physical phenomena,
link |
ball lightning, there's difficult things to artificially create in large amounts or observe
link |
in nature in large amounts in such a way that you can do to apply the scientific method.
link |
There could be just things that like what happened like a few times like or once and you're like,
link |
what the hell is that? And that that's very difficult for science to know what to do with.
link |
I'm a huge proponent of just being open minded because when you're open minded about aliens,
link |
for example, is it allows you to think outside of the box in other domains as well. And somehow
link |
that will result like if you open mind about aliens and you don't, you know, don't laugh it off
link |
immediately, what happens is somehow that's going to lead to a solution to a P equals on P or P
link |
not equals on P. Like in ways that you can't predict the open mindedness has tertiary effects
link |
that will result in progress, I believe, which is why I'm a huge fan of aliens because it's like
link |
because too many scientists roll their eyes at the idea of aliens, alien life. And to me,
link |
it's one of the most exciting possibilities and the biggest, most exciting questions
link |
before all of human civilization. So to roll your eyes is not the right answer. To roll your eyes
link |
presumes that you know anything about this world as opposed to just knowing point zero, zero, zero
link |
one percent of this world. And so being humble in the face of that, being open to the possibility
link |
of aliens visiting Earth is a good idea. Not everything though, I'm not so open minded to the
link |
flat earth hypothesis is there's a growing number of people believing in. But even then
link |
or the inner earth, I've got shouted at in a public talk about it. So like the Earth is hollow?
link |
Yeah, my understanding is that there's this conspiracy theory that as far as I can tell
link |
has no grounding in reality is that there's a slightly smaller earth inside this one, which is
link |
just too cute as a concept. And you can access it, I think, from Antarctica. And that's where we
link |
keep, and I quote, the mammoths and the Nazis. Yeah, I mean, that one is ridiculous. But like,
link |
I do like, hey, I thought you were keeping an open mind. I genuinely think that's more likely than
link |
aliens visiting the Earth. And I say this as someone who has dedicated her life to finding alien life.
link |
And so that's how improbable, I think, the visitations are. Because interstellar distances
link |
are so huge, that it's just not really worth it. See, I have a different view on this whole thing.
link |
I think the aliens that look like little green men are like extremely low probability event.
link |
Like mammoths and Nazis under that level. But other kind of ideas, the sad thing to me, and I think,
link |
in my view, if there's other alien civilizations out there, and they visited Earth,
link |
neither them, or perhaps just us, would be even able to detect them. We wouldn't be open
link |
minded enough to see it. Because our understanding of what is life, and I just
link |
talked to Sarah Walker, who's Sarah. Yeah, we talked for three hours about the question of what is life.
link |
Sarah's a good person to talk to about what is life. But the whole point is, we don't really,
link |
we have a very narrow minded view of what is life. And when it shows up, and it might be already here,
link |
trees, and dolphins, and so on, or mountains, or I don't know, or the molecules in the atmosphere,
link |
or like I, people make fun of me. But I do think that ideas are kind of aliens themselves,
link |
or consciousness could be the aliens, or it could be the method by which they communicate.
link |
We don't know shit about the way our human mind works. And the fact that this thing is a quantum
link |
process. Please don't. I understand this. It's not woo woo. But it very well could be. There
link |
could be something at the physics level, right? It could be at the chemical or the biological
link |
level. Things that are happening that we're just too close minded, because our conception of life
link |
is at the level of us, like at the jungle level of mammals. And on the time scale, that's the
link |
human time scale, we may not be able to perceive what alien life is actually like. The scale at
link |
which their intelligence realizes itself, we may not be able to perceive. And the other thing that's
link |
really important about alien visitations, whether it happened or not, is especially after COVID in
link |
2020, I'm losing a little bit of faith of our government being able to handle that well, not
link |
our government, but us as a society, as a collective, being able to deal with new things
link |
in an effective way that's inspiring, that's efficient, that like, whether it's if it's a
link |
dangerous thing to deal with it to alleviate the danger, whether it's the possibility of
link |
new discoveries and something inspiring to ride that wave and make it inspiring, all those kinds
link |
of things. I honestly think if aliens showed up, they would look around, everybody would ignore them,
link |
and the government might like hide it, try to like see to keep it from the Chinese and the
link |
Russians, if it's the United States, call it a military secret in a very close minded way.
link |
And then the bureaucracy would drown it away to where through paperwork, the poor aliens would
link |
just like waste away in a cell somewhere, like there's a certain that would never happen. Part
link |
of the reason that I feel so confident that aliens have no visited, because they would have had to
link |
visit just to have a look remotely, you know, from Neptune or something, which makes no sense,
link |
because interstellar travel is so difficult, that it would be quite a ridiculous proposition,
link |
but that's the bit that I think is technically possible. If they did come here, and they were
link |
visible by anyone, detectable by anyone, the thought that any government, no matter or any
link |
military could just contain them, these beings are capable of traveling interstellar distances
link |
when we can barely go to the moon, like barely go to the moon.
link |
So these things would be way, way, way, way.
link |
Way, and the fact that we think our puny military of any, even if all the military in the world
link |
got together, and the fact that they could somehow contain this, it's that.
link |
The ants trying to contain it, human that visited them.
link |
Exactly. And scientists, you would have to bring scientists on board. You've met a lot of scientists.
link |
How good are they at keeping secrets? Because in my experience, they're absolutely appalling
link |
at keeping secrets. Yeah, that's terrible.
link |
Even the Phosphine on Venus thing, which was a pretty well kept secret.
link |
Oh, this is true. You had a bunch of people there were.
link |
I told my dad, you know, my dad knew, and hopefully didn't tell anyone, but if there had
link |
been an alien visiting, he probably would have told the mate. And so these secrets could not be
link |
kept by any scientist that I know, and certainly not collaborative scientists, which would be
link |
needed. You would need all sorts of scientific teams. So between the pathetic power of any
link |
world's military compared to any civilization capable of traveling and our absolute inability
link |
to keep secrets, absolutely not. I will bet everything that we have not been visited because
link |
we are too pathetic to hold that truth. Well, let me put it back if we're just
link |
making like a $10 bet. The possibility here that the main alien, say there exists one alien
link |
civil, other intelligent alien civilization in the galaxy. To me, if they visit Earth,
link |
what's going to visit Earth is like the crappy, like the really crappy.
link |
Short straw. Yeah, yeah.
link |
Like this like really dumb thing that's, I don't know, like the early Game Boys or something.
link |
I think there's a cartoon about this. There's an alien that gets sent to Earth, Commander Spiff or
link |
something, and it's kind of a punishment or something. But that's not possible. That's the
link |
thing because interstellar distances are so hard to cross. You have to do it on purpose.
link |
You have to do it on purpose. It has to be a big, big deal. And we know this because, yes,
link |
you're right. We don't know enough about galactic biology. We don't know what the universal rules
link |
of biology or biochemistry are because we only have the Earth. But we do know that the laws of
link |
physics are universal. We can predict behavior in the universe and then see it happen based on
link |
these laws of physics. We know that the laws of chemistry are universal. We know the periodic table
link |
is all they have to choose from. So yes, they may be some sort of unimaginable intelligence,
link |
but they still have to use the same periodic table that we have access to. They still have
link |
a finite number of molecules they can do things with. So they still have to use the resources
link |
around them, the stars around them, the universe around them, and we know how much energy is in
link |
these places. And so, yes, they may be very capable, capable beyond our wildest dreams,
link |
but they're still in the same universe. And we know a lot of those rules. We're not completely
link |
blind. But there's a colleague here at Harvard, Kamran Vafa. He's a theoretical physicist. I
link |
don't know if you know him. I've only joined Harvard about six months ago. Okay. It's time to
link |
meet all the theoretical physicists. So he's a string theorist, but his idea is that aliens
link |
that are sophisticated enough to travel interstellar like those kinds of distances will figure out
link |
actually ways to hack the fabric of the universe enough to have fun in other ways. Like this
link |
universe is too boring. Like you would figure out ways to create other universes like you go
link |
outside the physics as we know it. So the reason we don't see aliens visiting us all over the place
link |
is they're having fun elsewhere. This is like way too boring. We humans think this is fun,
link |
but it's actually mostly empty space that no fun is happening. Like there's no fun in visiting Earth
link |
for super advanced civilizations. So he thinks like if alien civilizations are out there,
link |
they found outside of our current standard models of physics ways of having fun that don't involve
link |
us. That's probably true. But even the notion of visiting, that's so literally pedestrian.
link |
Of course, we want to go there because going there is the only thing we know. We see a thing we
link |
want. We want to go there and get it. But that is probably something they've no longer gotten
link |
need for. I specifically don't particularly want to go to space. Sounds awful. None of the things
link |
I like are going to be there. And my whole work is my whole career is finding life and
link |
understanding the universe. So I care a lot. But I care about knowing about it. And I feel no need
link |
to go there to learn about it. And I think as we develop better tools, hopefully people will feel
link |
less and less in need to go everywhere that we know about. And I would expect any alien civilization
link |
worth assault have developed observation tools and tools that allow them to understand the
link |
universe around them and beyond without having to go there. This going is so wasteful.
link |
Yeah. So more focus on the knowledge and learning versus the colonization, the conquering and all
link |
those kinds of things. That's beneath them. That's beneath them. I mean, that said, do you think
link |
there's any hopeful search for life through phosphine and other gases? Do you think there's
link |
other alien civilizations out there? First, do you think there's other life out there? First,
link |
do you think there's life in the solar system? Second, do you think there's life in the
link |
galaxy? And third, do you think there's intelligent life in the solar system or galaxy outside of
link |
Earth? So intelligent life, I have no idea. It seems deeply unlikely possible, but I'm not even
link |
sure if it's plausible. So that's a special thing to you about Earth is somehow intelligent life
link |
came to be. Yes. And it's only very briefly, probably extremely briefly. Uh oh. You mean
link |
it's always going to be like we're going to destroy ourselves? Exactly. Oh boy. And life will
link |
continue on Earth happily, probably more happily. The trees and the dolphins will be here, I'm
link |
telling you. And the cockroaches and the incredible fungi, they'll be fine. So life on Earth was
link |
fine before us and will be fine after us. So I'm not that worried about intelligent life,
link |
but I think it is unlikely. Even on Earth is unlikely. Out of what is it, five billion species
link |
across the history of the Earth? Yes. There's been one, an intelligent one. And for a blink of an eye,
link |
possibly not much longer than that. So I wouldn't bet on that at all, though I would love it, of
link |
course. You know, I wanted to find aliens since I was a little girl. And so of course I initially
link |
wanted to find ones that I could be friends with. Yeah. And I've had to let go of that dream because
link |
it's so deeply implausible. But see, the nice, I'm sorry to interrupt, but the nice thing about
link |
intelligent alien civilizations, they may have more biosignatures than nonintelligent ones.
link |
So they might be easier to detect. That would be the hope. On Earth, that's not the case,
link |
but it could be the case elsewhere. Oh, it's not the case on Earth. Most of the biosignatures we
link |
have on Earth are created by quite simple life. If you don't count pollution, pollution is all.
link |
So you don't see polluting gases as a possible, like... I look for polluting gases. I would love
link |
to find polluting gases. Well, you know, I'll be worried for them, of course, the same way I
link |
think about my alien colleagues all the time looking at us, and I'm sure they worry about our
link |
pollutions. But it would be a really good, robust, unambiguous sign of life if we found
link |
complex pollutants. So I look for those too. I just don't have any hope of finding them. I think
link |
intelligent life in the galaxy at the same time that we're looking is deeply implausible. But life,
link |
I think, is inevitable. And if it is inevitable, it is common. So I think there'll be life
link |
everywhere in the galaxy. Now, how common that life is, I think will depend a lot on whether
link |
there's life in the solar system beyond Earth. So I'll adjust my expectations very much based
link |
on there being life in the solar system. If there's life in the Venusian clouds,
link |
if there's life in the, if there are biasingers coming out of the plumes of Enceladus, if there's
link |
life on Titan. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah, plumes of Enceladus. That's the Saturn one.
link |
It's the moon that has the geysers that come out. And so you can't see the under the subterranean
link |
oceans. But it's supposed, so it would be in the atmosphere. I was going to ask you about that one.
link |
Have you looked at that? Have you? Is that a hope for you to use the tools you're using with
link |
Rascal and other ways for detecting the 16,000 molecules that might be biosignatures to look at
link |
Enceladus? Yes, that's absolutely the plan. What's the limiting factor currently? Is it the
link |
quality of the telescopes? What's the quality of the data? Yeah, the quality of the data,
link |
the observational data, and also the quality of Rascal and other associated things. So we're missing
link |
a lot of fundamental data to interpret the data that we get, and we don't have good enough data.
link |
But hopefully we will, in the coming decades, we'll get some information on Titan. We have
link |
Dragonfly going over. We'll get the plumes of Enceladus. We will look at the clouds of Enus,
link |
and there's other places. And so if we find any life or any sign of life ever, like on Mars,
link |
then I'll adjust my calculations, and I'll say life is not just inevitable and common,
link |
but extremely common. Because all of these places we've mentioned, the Subterranean Oceans on Enceladus,
link |
the methane oceans of Titan, the clouds of Enus, the acidic clouds of Enus, these are places that
link |
are very different from the places where we find life on Earth, even the most extreme places.
link |
And so if life can originate in all of these completely different habitats, then life is
link |
even more resourceful than we thought, which means it's everywhere.
link |
That's really exciting if it's everywhere. If there's life on just one of the moons,
link |
if it's on Mars. Anywhere in the solar system, and I will bet everything I own that every solar
link |
system, every planetary system has a potential for habitability. Because even if they don't have a
link |
habitable planet, they'll have moons around other giant planets, and there'll be so much life. So for
link |
me, that's the only thing to figure out now, whether life is inevitable and quite common
link |
throughout the galaxy or everywhere. But it's somewhere between those two.
link |
Intelligent life, I make no bets. And if I had to bet, I would be against.
link |
Yeah, to me, like two discoveries in the 21st century would change everything.
link |
One is, and maybe I'm biased, but one is a discovery of life in the solar system.
link |
I feel like that would change our whole conception of how unique we are in the universe.
link |
I think I'm much more eager than you are to jump from basic life to intelligent life.
link |
I feel like if there's life everywhere, like the odds are, we cannot...
link |
Oh, I see. You're saying there could have been many intelligent civilizations out there,
link |
but they just keep dying out. It's like little... Yeah, I was detecting them, ships in the night.
link |
Ships in the night. That's ultra sad. Just like... Is it sad? The earth is not better for having us.
link |
Is it... It doesn't owe us anything. Would you be sad to find alien giraffes?
link |
Would you be disappointed if you found alien giraffes? Because I would not.
link |
No. Well, giraffes, first of all, they look goofy with their necks and everything, but...
link |
No, we do not shit on giraffes. Giraffes are wondrous animals that are deeply understudied.
link |
We still know so little about them because no one does PhDs and giraffes. I am,
link |
there's a point I made at PhD in Phosphine when people aren't doing PhDs and giraffes.
link |
We do not know enough about giraffes. I think it was like Ricky Gervais that
link |
did a whole, like, long thing about... You don't trust Ricky Gervais to talk about
link |
giraffes. That is not his expertise. Yeah, but it's a stupid necks. It doesn't make any sense.
link |
I mean, that's fine. Giraffes are very resourceful animals who do incredible things and can
link |
kick a lion in the face. Why don't you climb the tree? Why don't you climb the tree? You don't
link |
need to grow through the lengthy evolutionary process. You don't need to be shitting on giraffes.
link |
Giraffes are wondrous animals. I would very appreciate it. Take it back.
link |
I take it back. I apologize. I trust your expertise on this. The thing that makes humans really
link |
fascinating and I think the earth, but I'm a human, is we create things that are,
link |
yes, there's all the ugliness in the world. There's all the biological and the chemical
link |
level. There's the pollution, but we create beauty. If you, even from a physics perspective,
link |
look at symmetry as somehow capturing beauty, the breaking of symmetries, stuff grounded in all
link |
the different definitions of symmetry, we're good at, like, creating things. So as fighters.
link |
But not giraffes. Okay, but yes, this is... There are fighters that create little bubbles of air
link |
so they can breathe underwater. They can literally scuba dive. There are spiders that can create
link |
parachutes so they can glide and talk about symmetry. Look what spiders can do. I just thought
link |
of spiders, but if I was an alien species coming to earth, there'll be plenty to wonder and we
link |
would just be one. One of the things. Yeah, clunky, naked monkey. Yeah, the ants might be
link |
even more fascinating. The ants. Ants can figure out exactly through some emergent consciousness
link |
what the maximum distance between their trash, their babies, and their food is just from without
link |
any of them knowing how to do this. And collectively, they've learned how to do this. If I was an alien
link |
species, I'll be looking at that. Well, so that was the other thing I was going to mention. The
link |
second thing is I tend to believe we can engineer consciousness, but at the basic level, understand
link |
the source of consciousness because if consciousness is unique to humans and if we can engineer it,
link |
that gives me hope that it can be present elsewhere in the universe. That's the other thing that makes...
link |
It's an open question that makes humans perhaps special is not maybe the presence of consciousness,
link |
but somehow a presence of elevated consciousness. It does, again, maybe human centric, but it feels
link |
like we're more conscious than giraffes, for example, in spiders. Yes, I won't deny that.
link |
There is something special about humans. They're my favorite species. They are.
link |
Some of my best friends are humans. I think Kylie of humans, it's great. I just don't have
link |
great hope for our longevity and specifically, I don't have great hope given that we're the only
link |
species that are 5 billion that did this cool consciousness trick. I don't want to bet on
link |
finding a kinship elsewhere. That's quite interesting to think about. I don't think I've
link |
even considered that possibility that there would be life in the solar system. That indicates that
link |
very possibly life is literally everywhere. Yeah, everywhere can happen. It does.
link |
Yeah, and especially what we're discovering with the exoplanets now,
link |
they're how numerous they are, or Earthlike habitable, quote unquote planets. They're everywhere.
link |
The most common type of planet is rocky, it seems.
link |
But I didn't consider the possibility that life is literally everywhere and yet intelligent life
link |
is nowhere long enough to communicate with each other, to form little clusters
link |
of civilizations that expand beyond the solar system and so on.
link |
Man, maybe becoming a multiplanetary species is a less likely pursuit than we imagined.
link |
But one of the things that makes humans beautiful is we hope.
link |
But I hope for humanity. And one of the things I hope for is that we become less
link |
obsessed with conquering and we become less obsessed with spreading ourselves.
link |
I hope that we transcend that, that we're happy with the universe without having to go and take it.
link |
So you can hope for the species without hoping for a multiplanetary existence. That is only,
link |
I think, the drive of our most primitive instincts to go and take, to go and plant a
link |
flag somewhere. We love planting a flag somewhere. And maybe we could overcome that minor drive.
link |
And once we do, the AI systems we build will destroy us because we're too peaceful and they
link |
will go and conquer and plant the flags. Best of luck to them. The cockroaches will be happy to
link |
keep to the business as they always have. I tend to believe that robots can have the same
link |
elegance and consciousness and all the qualities of kindness and love and hope and fear that
link |
that humans have. In principle, they could, yes. I don't really trust the people who make them.
link |
This is about the giraffe comment, isn't it? I haven't forgiven you for shitting on
link |
giraffes. What have they done to you? Just as a small tangent, your master's thesis is also
link |
fascinating. Maybe we could talk about it for just a little bit. It's titled,
link |
Influence of a Star's Evolution on His Planetary System. So this interplay between a star and a
link |
planet, is there something interesting you could say about what you've learned about this journey
link |
that a star takes and the planets around it? Well, when I was younger and I was told what
link |
would happen ultimately to the Earth as the sun expands towards a red giant and
link |
then Mercury would just fall in and then Venus fall in and the sun doesn't care.
link |
I felt so small. I felt like the Earth and everything on it, the universe doesn't care.
link |
Even our sun doesn't care. I think I felt like our sun should feel some sort of responsibility
link |
for its planets. It just felt like such a violent and neglectful parent.
link |
It's like a parent eating its own children. It's horrible. It's just a horrible notion.
link |
But it made me think, what if there's some sort of generation? And so at the time when I was doing
link |
my masters, there was a notion of the white dwarf cemetery, which is this idea that when
link |
stars become white wolves, that death is so horrible that planets, potentially habitable
link |
planets that could have been habitable before, they're now gone. There's no chance for life.
link |
But then I thought, what if life returns? Now it's a white dwarf. It's calmed down.
link |
It's not going to go anywhere. White dwarfs are very stable across universal time scales.
link |
And so could you have planets around the white dwarf that could themselves get life again?
link |
You know, life doesn't care. And so my work was basically killing dozens of planets,
link |
thousands of times. I just ran thousands and thousands of body simulations.
link |
But you simulated this?
link |
Yeah. So I simulated the star growing and just eating all these planets up and just
link |
absolute chaos. The orbits of the planets would change as the star loses mass. So you would have
link |
like Jupiter planets just crashing into the other planets, throwing them into the sun early.
link |
It was terrifying to watch these simulations. It was absolute carnage.
link |
But if you run thousands of these simulations, some systems find new balance ways of staying alive.
link |
Some systems post star death find stable orbits again for billions of years,
link |
more than enough for life to originate again. And so that was my idea during that time that
link |
thesis was trying to explore this notion of life coming back. And this idea of the universe
link |
doesn't care if you're here or not. And it will go about its business. Andromeda will crash into us
link |
and doesn't care. No one cares if you're alive in the universe. And so letting go of that
link |
preciousness of life, I found very useful at that stage of my career. And instead,
link |
I just thought, what if life is inevitable? It doesn't matter that it came by four billion
link |
years ago. It can start again four billion years later. And maybe that is nice. Maybe that's where
link |
hope lies, the phoenix rising everywhere, planets being destroyed and created. And we're here now.
link |
And others will be more or less here ish billions of years later.
link |
So accepting the cycle of death and life. And not taking it personally. Not taking it personally.
link |
The sun doesn't owe us anything. It's not a bad parent. It's not a parent at all.
link |
Yeah. I was looking at the work of Freeman Dyson and seeing how this universe eventually will
link |
just be a bunch of supermassive black holes before they also evaporate. A bunch of tiny
link |
black holes too. Absolutely quiet. Everyone, all the black holes a little too far away from one
link |
another to even interact until it's just silence forever. But until then, many, many cycles of
link |
death and destruction and rebirth. And rebirth. You kept bringing up sort of coding stuff up.
link |
I wanted to ask two things. First of all, what programming language do you like? And also, what
link |
because you're as a computational quantum astrochemist? No.
link |
No, that's correct. That's right. You're kind of, you could say you're
link |
actually understanding some exceptionally complicated things with one of the things
link |
you're using is the tools of computation, of programming. Is there a device you can give to
link |
people? Because I know quite a few that have not practiced that tool and have fallen in love with
link |
a particular science, whatever it's biology and chemistry and physics and so on. And if they
link |
were interested in learning to program and learning to use computation as a tool in their
link |
particular science, is there advice you can give on programming and also just maybe a comment on
link |
your own journey and the use of programming in your own life? Well, I'm a terrible programmer.
link |
A lot of scientists, the programming is bad because we never learned formal programming.
link |
We learned science, physics, chemistry. And then we were told, oh, you have to get these
link |
equations modeled and run through a simulation. And you're like, oh, okay, so I'm going to learn
link |
how to code to do this. And you learn just as much as you need to run these simulations and no more.
link |
So they're rarely optimized. They're really clunky. Six months later, you can't read your own
link |
code. My variable names are extremely embarrassing. I still have error messages for different
link |
compilation errors. I say things like, at least your dad loves you, Clara. You know,
link |
it doesn't help me at all. So it's like humor. Yeah. Just like you suck at coding. But there's
link |
other things in your life. So I'm a bad programmer. And so if that will give hope to anyone else who's
link |
a bad programmer, I can still do pretty impressive science. Yes. But I learned, I think I started
link |
learning Matlab and Java when I was in college. It did me no good at all. It has not been particularly
link |
useful. I learned some Fortran that was very useful, even though it's really not a fun language,
link |
because so much of legacy code is in Fortran. And so if you want to use other people's code who
link |
have now retired, Fortran will be nice. And then I used IDL to visualize. So that simulation and
link |
body simulation, that was all Fortran and IDL. But thankfully, since I've left college, I've
link |
just learned Python like a normal person. And that has been much nicer. So most of my code now is in
link |
Python. I should also make a few quick comments as well. So one is you say you're sort of bad at
link |
programming. I've worked with a lot of excellent scientists that are quote unquote, bad at programming.
link |
They're not, it gets the job done. In fact, there's a downside to sort of especially getting a
link |
software engineering education. If I were to give advice, especially if you're doing a computer
link |
science degree and you're doing software engineering, is not to get lost in the,
link |
in the, like optimization of the correct, there's an obsession, you can see it in like stack overflow
link |
of the correct way to do things. And I think you can too easily get lost in constantly trying to
link |
optimize and do things the correct way when you actually never get done. The same thing happens,
link |
you have like communities of people obsessed with productivity. And they keep researching
link |
productivity hacks, and then they spent like 90% plus of their time figuring out how to do things
link |
productively, and they never actually do anything. So there's a certain sense if you focus on the
link |
task that needs to be done, that's what programming is for. So not over optimizing, not, not focus,
link |
not thinking about variable names in the, in the following sense. Sometimes you think, okay,
link |
I'm going to write code that's going to last for decades. In reality, your code, if it's well
link |
written or poorly written, will be very likely obsolete very quickly. And the point is to get
link |
the job done really well. So there's a trade off there that you'll, you have to, you have to make
link |
sure to strike. I should also comment as a public service announcement, or a request, if there's
link |
any world class Fortran or Cobalt programmers out there, I'm looking for them, I want to talk to
link |
you. Because that will not be me. I'm a terrible Fortran programmer.
link |
But it's fascinating because so much of the world in the past, and still runs programming
link |
languages. And there's like no experts on it. So they're all retiring. Yeah. I, I disagree slightly
link |
in that I think because I can get the job done, I'm a programmer. But because no one else can look
link |
at my code and know how I got my job done, I'm a bad programmer. That's how I'm defining it.
link |
Including yourself, including myself six months later, I'm working with a new student right now.
link |
And she sent me some messages on Slack being like, what is this? What is this file that you've got
link |
with some functions around? And I was like, I, I, this was from 2018. It wasn't that long ago.
link |
And I can no longer remember what that code does. I'm going to spend now two days reading through
link |
my own code and trying to improve it. And I do think that's frustrating. And so I think my advice
link |
to any young people who want to get into astronomy or astrobiology or quantum chemistry
link |
is that I certainly find it much easier to teach the science concepts to a programmer
link |
than the programming to a scientist. And so I would much, much faster hire someone who knows
link |
programming but barely knows where space is than teach programming to an astronomer.
link |
Oh, that's fascinating. Yeah. Okay. This is true. I mean, yeah, there's some basics.
link |
I'm, I'm focusing too much on the silver lining because I have the people that were like MATLAB
link |
code. Yeah. Single variable, single letter variable names, those kinds of things.
link |
And it's accessibility, right? It's, I want my, my code to be open source. But, and it is,
link |
it's on GitHub, anyone can download it. But is it really open source if it's written so cryptically,
link |
so poorly that no one can really use it to its full functionality? Have I really published my work?
link |
And that weighs on, on me. I feel guilty for my own inadequacies as a programmer.
link |
You can only do so much. I've already learned quantum chemistry and astrophysics. So, you know.
link |
Yeah. I mean, there's, there's, there's all kinds of ways to contribute to the world. One of them
link |
is publication, but publishing code is, is a fascinating way to contribute to the world,
link |
even if it's very small, very basic element, great code. I guess I was also kind of criticizing the
link |
software engineering process versus like, which is a good thing to do is code that's readable,
link |
almost like without documentation. It's readable. It's understandable. The variable names, the
link |
structure, all those kinds of things. And that's the dream. That's the dream. This is a dumb question.
link |
No, I'll tell you a dumb question. I want to hear it.
link |
Okay. I mean, okay. This is the question about beauty. It's way too general. It's very impossible.
link |
It's like asking, what's your favorite band? What's your favorite music band?
link |
Oh, I thought you meant wavelength band. I was like, I definitely have favorite wavelength bands.
link |
Absolutely. Well, it's hard to narrow down. Okay.
link |
Okay. What, what do you use the most beautiful idea in science?
link |
It's not a dumb question. Do you want to try that question again, proudly?
link |
Okay. I have a really good question to ask you.
link |
Okay. Don't, don't oversell it. I've got an okay question to ask you, you know?
link |
I've, yeah. What, what do you, is the most beautiful idea in, in science, something you
link |
just find inspiring or just maybe the reason you got into science or the reason you think science is
link |
cool? My favorite thing about science is kind of the connection between the scales. So
link |
when I was little and I wanted to know about space, I really felt that it would make me feel
link |
powerful to be able to predict the heavens, something so much larger than myself
link |
that felt really powerful. It was almost a selfish desire. And that's what I wanted.
link |
There was some control to being able to know exactly what the sky would do.
link |
And then as I got older and I got more into astronomy and I didn't just want to know how
link |
the stars moved. I wanted to know how the planets around them moved. And,
link |
and then as I got deeper into that field, I really didn't care that much about the planets.
link |
I want to know about the atmospheres around the planets and then the molecules within those
link |
atmospheres and what that might mean. So I ended up shrinking my scale until it was literally the
link |
quantum scale. And now all my work, the majority of my work is on this insane quantum scale.
link |
And yet I'm using these literal tiny, tiny tools to try and answer the greatest questions
link |
that we've ever been able to ask. And this crossing of scales from the quantum to the
link |
astronomical. That's so cool, isn't it?
link |
Yeah. It spans the entirety, the tiny and the huge. That's the cool thing about, I guess,
link |
being a quantum astrochemist is you're using the tools of the tiny to look at the heavenly bodies,
link |
the giant stuff. And the potential life out there, that this is the thing that connects us,
link |
that you can't escape the rules of the quantum world and how universal they themselves are,
link |
despite being probabilistic. And that makes me feel really pleased to be in science,
link |
but in a really humbling way. It's no longer this thirst for power. I feel less special the
link |
more work I do, less exceptional the more work I do. I feel like humans in the earth and our
link |
place in the universe is less and less exceptional. And yet I feel so much less lonely. And so it's
link |
been a really good trade off that I've lost power, but I've gained company.
link |
Wow, that's a beautiful answer. I don't think there's a better way to actually end it. You're
link |
right. I asked a mediocre question and you came through, you made the question good
link |
by a brilliant answer. You're the Michael Jordan and I'll be the Dennis Rodman.
link |
I don't know enough about basketball. I mean, literally you've reached the peak of my basketball
link |
knowledge because I know though those people are basketball pros, I believe, but only because
link |
I watch Space Jam, I think. Are there books or movies in your life long ago or recently?
link |
Do you have any time for books and movies? Had an impact on you? What ideas did you take away?
link |
I absolutely have time for books and movies. I try as best I can to not work very hard.
link |
I mostly fail, I should point out. But I think I'm a better scientist when I don't work evenings
link |
and weekends. If I get four good hours in a day, I often don't. I often get eight crappy hours,
link |
emails, meetings, bad code, data processing. But if I can get four high quality scientific hours,
link |
I just stop working for the day because I know it's diminishing returns after that.
link |
So I have a lot of time. I try to make as much time as I can.
link |
Can you dig into what it takes to be one productive, two to be happy as a researcher?
link |
Because I think it's too easy in that world to basic, because you have so many hats,
link |
you have to wear so many jobs, you have to be a mentor, a teacher, head of a research group,
link |
do research yourself, you have to do service, all the kinds of stuff you're doing now with
link |
education and interviews. Yeah. So as a public science, like being a public communicator,
link |
that's a job. Yeah. The whole thing. It's very poorly.
link |
I'll pay you in Bitcoin. Okay. I'll take Bitcoin.
link |
So is there some advice you can give to the process of being productive and happy as a researcher?
link |
I think sadly, it's very hard to feel happy as a scientist if you're not productive.
link |
It's a bit of a trap, but I certainly find it very difficult to feel happy when I'm not being
link |
productive. It's become slightly better if I know my students are being productive,
link |
I can be happy. But I think a lot of senior scientists, once they get into that mindset,
link |
they start thinking that their student science is theirs. And I think this happens a lot of
link |
senior scientists. They have so many hats, as you mentioned, they have to do so much service
link |
and so much admin that they have very little time for their own science. And so they end up
link |
feeling ownership over the junior people in their labs and their groups. And that's really
link |
heartbreaking. I see it all the time. And that I think I've escaped that trap. I feel so happy,
link |
even when I'm not productive, when my students are productive. I think that sensation I was
link |
describing earlier, they only need to be half as productive as me for me to feel like I've done
link |
my job for humanity. So that has been the dynamic I've had to worry about. But to be productive
link |
is not clear to me what you have to do. You have to not be miserable otherwise. I find it extremely
link |
hard when I'm having conflicts with collaborators, for example, kind of very hard to enjoy the work
link |
we do, even if the work is this fantastical phosphine or things that I know I love,
link |
still very difficult. So I think choosing your collaborators based on how well you get along
link |
with them is a really sound scientific choice. Having a miserable collaborator ruins your whole
link |
life. It's horrible. It makes you not want to do the science. It probably makes you do clumsy
link |
science because you don't focus on it. You don't go over it several times. You just want it to be
link |
over. And so I think in general, just not being a douchebag can get so much good science done.
link |
Just find the good people in your community and collaborate with them. Even if they're not as
link |
good scientists as others, you'll get better science out. Yeah, don't be a douchebag yourself
link |
and surround yourself by other cool people. Exactly. And then you'll get better science.
link |
And if you would try to work with three geniuses who are just hell to be around.
link |
Yeah. I mean, there's parallel things like that. I'm very fortunate now. I was very
link |
fortunate at MIT to have friends and colleagues there. They were incredible to work with.
link |
But I'm currently sort of, I'm doing a lot of fun stuff on the side,
link |
like this little podcast thing. And I mentioned to you, I think robotics related stuff.
link |
I was just at Boston Dynamics yesterday checking out their robots. And I'm currently,
link |
I guess, hiring people to help me with a very fun little project around those robots.
link |
Want to put an ad in? No. I have more applications I can possibly deal with. There's thousands.
link |
So it's not an ad. It's the opposite. We need to put an ad out for someone to help
link |
you go through the applications. Well, that too is already there. That's over 10,000 people applied
link |
for that. An infinite master of application management. But the point is, it's not exactly,
link |
the point is like what I'm very distinctly aware of is life is short and productivity
link |
is not the right goal to optimize for, at least for me. The right goal to optimize for
link |
is how happy you are to wake up in the day and to work with the people that you do.
link |
Because the productivity will take care of itself. Agreed.
link |
And so it's so important to select the people well. And I think one of the challenges with
link |
academia as opposed to the sort of thing I'm currently doing is saying goodbye is sometimes
link |
a little bit tougher because your colleagues are there. I mean, goodbye hurts. And then if you
link |
have to spend the rest for many years to come, still surrounded by them in the community,
link |
it's tougher. It kind of adds, puts extra pressure to stay in that relationship,
link |
in that collaboration. And in some sense, that makes it much more difficult, but it's still
link |
worth it. It's still worth it to break ties. If you're not happy, if there's not that magic,
link |
that dance. I talked to this guy named Daniel Kahneman. Oh, I know. Danny Kahneman. Danny, yeah.
link |
Boy, did that guy make me realize what a great collaborator is. Well, he had Tversky, right?
link |
Yeah. But they had, obviously, they had a really deep collaboration there. But I collaborated
link |
with him on a conversation, just like talking about, I don't know what we're talking about.
link |
I think cars, autonomous vehicles. But the brainstorming session, I'm like a nobody. And
link |
the fact that he would, with that childlike curiosity, and that dance of thoughts and ideas,
link |
and the push and pull, and the lack of ego, but then enough ego to have a little bit of a stubbornness
link |
over an idea, and a little bit of humor, and all those things. It's like, holy shit, that person,
link |
also the ability to truly listen to another human. It's like, okay, that's what it takes to be a good
link |
collaborator. It makes me realize that I haven't been, I've been very fortunate to have cool people
link |
in my life, but there's like levels even to the cool. Yeah, I don't think you can compete with
link |
Danny Kahneman on cool. He's just incredible. But it was like, okay, I guess what I'm trying to say
link |
is that collaboration is an art form. But perhaps it's actually a skill, is allowing yourself
link |
to develop that skill, because that's one of the fruitful skills.
link |
And praise it in students. And I think it is something you can really improve on. I've become a
link |
better collaborator as the years have gone on. I don't have some innate collaborative skills.
link |
I think they're skills I've developed. And I think in science, there's this
link |
really destructive notion of the lone wolf, the scientist who sees things where others don't.
link |
Then that's really appealing. And people really like either fulfilling that or pretending to
link |
be fulfilling that. And first of all, it's mostly a lie. Any modern scientist, particularly in astronomy,
link |
which is so interdisciplinary, any modern scientist as doing it on their own is doing a crappy job,
link |
most likely. Because you need an independent set of eyes to help you do things. You need
link |
experts in the subfields that you're working on to check your work. But most importantly,
link |
it's just a bad idea. It doesn't lead to good science, and it leaves you miserable.
link |
I recently had some work that I was avoiding, and I thought, maybe I should pursue this scientific
link |
project, because I don't care enough about the outcome, and it's going to be a lot of hard work.
link |
And I was trying to balance these two things. It's really difficult, and the outcome is that
link |
maybe 10 people will cite me in the next decade, because it's not. No one's asking for this question
link |
to be answered. And then I found myself working with this collaborator, Jason Dipman. And I spent
link |
a whole afternoon, hours with him working on this, and time flew by, and I just felt taller, and
link |
like I could breathe better. I was happier. I was a better person when it was done. And
link |
that's because he's a great collaborator. He's just a wonderful person that brings out joy out
link |
of science that you're doing with him. And that's really the trick. You find the people
link |
that make you feel that way about the science you're doing, and you stop worrying about being
link |
the lone wolf. That's just a terrible dream that will leave you miserable, and your science will
link |
be shit. And since I'm Russian, just murder anybody who doesn't fall into that beautiful
link |
collaborative relationship. We were talking about books. Books, yes. Is there books, movies?
link |
Why was I talking about my productivity? Oh, you said you maybe don't have time for books and
link |
movies. And you said you must make time for books and movies. Make time to not work. Make time to
link |
not work, whatever that looks like to you. But there's plenty. When I was younger, I found a lot
link |
of my scientific fulfillment in books and movies. Now as I got older, I have plenty of that in my
link |
work. And I try to read outside my field. I read about Danny Kahneman's work instead.
link |
But when I was little, it was contact, the book, the Carl Sagan book. I really thought I was just
link |
like Ellie. And I was going to become Ellie. I really resonated with me, their character and the
link |
notions of life and space in the universe. Even the idea of then the movie came out and I got to put
link |
Jodie Foster in that, which helped. But even the notion of if it is just us, what an awful waste
link |
of space. I found extremely useful as a concept to think. Maybe we are special, but that would suck
link |
is a really nice way of thinking of the search for life, that it's much better to not be special
link |
and have company. I got that from Carl Sagan. So that's where I always recommend.
link |
Let me ask one other ridiculous question. We talked about the death and life cycle
link |
that is ever present in the universe until it's not, until it's supermassive and little black
link |
holes too at the end of the universe. What do you think is the why, the meaning of it all?
link |
What do you think is the meaning of life here on earth and the meaning of that life that you look
link |
for, whether it's on Venus or other exoplanets? I think there's none. I find enormous relief
link |
in the absence of meaning. I think chasing for meaning is a human desire that the universe
link |
doesn't give two shits about. But you still enjoy... I enjoy finding meaning in my life.
link |
I enjoy finding where the morality lies. I enjoy the complication of that desire
link |
here, and I feel that is deeply human, but I don't feel that it's universal.
link |
It's somehow absolute. We conjure it up. We bring it to life through our own minds,
link |
but it's not any kind of fundamental way real. No. And the same way the sun is not to be blamed
link |
for destroying its own planets, the universe doesn't care because it has no meaning. It
link |
owes us nothing. And looking for meaning in the universe is demanding answers. Who are we? We're
link |
nothing. We don't get to demand anything, and that includes meaning. And I find it very reassuring
link |
because once there is no meaning, I don't have to find it. Yeah. Once there's no meaning, it's a
link |
kind of freedom in a way. You sound a bit like... I'm happy about it. This isn't a depressing outlook
link |
as far as I'm concerned. It's happiness. Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, there's, I don't know if you know
link |
who Sam Harris is, but he, despite the pushbacks from the entirety of the world, really argues
link |
hard that there's that free will as an illusion, that the deterministic universe and it's all
link |
already been predetermined, and he's okay with it. And he's happy with it, that he's distinctly
link |
aware of it. The quantum world will disagree with him on the deterministic nature of nature.
link |
Well, he's not saying it's deterministic, but he's saying that the randomness doesn't
link |
help either. Like, randomness does not help in the experience of feeling like you're the
link |
decider of your own actions. That he kind of is okay with being a leaf flowing on the river,
link |
like, or being the river, right, as opposed to having or being like a fish or something,
link |
they can decide its swimming direction. He's okay just embracing the flow of life. I mean,
link |
that same way, it kind of sounds like your conception of meaning. I mean, it just is,
link |
it doesn't, the universe doesn't care. It just is what it is and we experience certain things
link |
and some feel good and some don't. And that's life. But I don't feel like that about life.
link |
I think life does have meaning and there's, and it's laudable to look for that meaning in life.
link |
I just don't think you can apply that beyond life and certainly not beyond Earth, that this
link |
notion of meaning is a human construct. And so it only applies within us and the other life forms
link |
and planet types that suffer from our intrusions or rejoice from our interactions. But this meaning
link |
is ours to do as we please. We've created it. We've created a need for it. And so that's our problem
link |
to solve. I don't apply it beyond us. I think we as humans have a lot of responsibilities,
link |
but they're moral responsibilities. And a lot of those responsibilities are much more easily
link |
fulfilled if you find meaning in them. So I think there's value to meaning, whether it's real or not.
link |
I just think we gain nothing from trying to anthropomorphize the entire universe. And also,
link |
that's the height of hubris. That's not for us to do.
link |
Yeah, it also could be just like duality in quantum mechanics. It could be both
link |
that there is meaning and then there isn't. And we're somehow depending on the observer,
link |
depending on the perspective you take on the thing.
link |
I mean, even on Earth, that's true. Whether things have meaning or not depends a lot on who's looking.
link |
Whether it's us humans, the aliens, or the giraffes. Clara, this was an incredible conversation.
link |
I mean, I learned so much, but I also am just inspired by the passion you have.
link |
Not finding meaning in the universe. I'm very passionate about not finding meaning in the
link |
universe. You're the most inspiring nihilist I've ever met. I'm just kidding.
link |
I mean, you are truly an inspiring communicator of everything from
link |
phosphine to life to quantum astral chemistry. I can't wait to see what other cool things you do
link |
in your career, in your scientific life. Thank you so much for wasting your valuable time with
link |
me today. I really appreciate it. It was my pleasure. I had already got my four hours of
link |
productivity before I got here and so it's not a waste. It's all downhill from there. Thank you.
link |
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Clara Sousa Silva and thank you to
link |
On It, Grammarly, Blinkist, and Indeed. Check them out in the description to support
link |
this podcast. And now let me leave you some words from Konstantin Zilkovsky.
link |
The Earth is the cradle of humanity, but mankind cannot stay in the cradle forever.
link |
Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.