Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization

The concept of exponential growth is crucial for understanding both the cosmic perspective and evidence-based thinking. Exponential growth is a growth pattern that becomes increasingly rapid in proportion to the growing number or size. Tyson gives a functional example through describing algae growth: If algae on a lake doubles each day, and if it takes one month for the lake to be half covered, it will take one day more for the lake to be entirely covered.

A social phenomenon in which a strong desire to conform influences well-intentioned individuals in a group, groupthink results in poor or irrational decisions. Consequences of groupthink include the loss of creativity, independence, and individuality. Starry Messenger presents groupthink as a cause of irrational and avoidable social problems, such as science denial, oppression, and war.

A space station that numerous space-faring countries organized, constructed, use, and maintain, the International Space Station (ISS) serves as a shelter and a laboratory for space travelers. It allows researchers to study the impacts of living and working in space. Participating countries include the US, Canada, Japan, Russia, Belgium, Germany, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Great Britain, and the United Arab Emirates.

Tyson uses the terms meatarian, vegetarian, and vegan to describe human diets, as opposed to the scientific terms of carnivorous (meat-eating), omnivorous (meat- and plant-eating), and herbivorous (plant-eating). Meatarians follow an omnivorous diet, eating both plants and animal meat. Vegetarians eat plants and non-meat animal products like cheese; in addition, they often eat the meat of animals they perceive as having lower sentience, like mollusks or fish. Vegans eat only plants, consuming no types of animal-based products.

A fictional cyber-country, Rationalia is a hypothetical place that Tyson and others imagined in 2016 during the Starmus science festival. The group suggested that the government would employ a rational, evidence-based approach to create policies and proposed that membership would be optional and would not have immigration rules or citizenship tests. Tyson proposed Rationalia to the public through a Tweet in 2016, and the concept met harsh criticism.

Statistics is a branch of mathematics that deals with collecting, analyzing, and interpreting large amounts of numerical information. Its purpose is often to infer probability. Probability is a mathematical branch that examines the likeliness of a proposition being true or the likeliness of an event. Statistics and probability are used together because probability theory interprets collected statistical data. Conclusions from statistics and probability provide objective information that often misaligns with assumptions, as Tyson demonstrates through the examples of doubling a penny each day for a month and the exponential-growth analogy of an algae-covered lake.

The foundation for Tyson’s message of evidence-based thinking and for the overall concept of science is the scientific method, sometimes called the scientific process. The scientific method is a series of steps designed to eliminate bias and identify flaws. The general steps of the process include posing a question or making an observation, conducting research, forming a hypothesis, designing an experiment or other test, and drawing a conclusion.