The first 1,000 people to use the link will get a 1 month free trial of Skillshare: skl.sh/tibees08221 Apologies to today's patron cat (dog) of the day, Izzy, whose name was truncated from the end.

Neil wakes up his whole family to tell them he's going to bed

One of the first things I was told when doing a PhD was "you're not expected to change the world". A small contribution is a catalyst to greater knowledge over time.

Neil was my Astronomy TA at the University of Texas and also a friend. He always has demonstrated an ability to take complex situations and make them understandable to anyone.

Just like Neil deGrasse Tyson, you have an adept way of communicating your synopsis of his 370 page thesis to people such as myself, who failed miserably at their academic studies, but still enjoy learning from those who excelled to PhD level. Your voice is so gentle & pleasant to listen to which helps when trying to comprehend this complex subject.

After reading the comments I see a very obvious problem with perception of scientists by general public: They expect literally every thesis and paper to be some "huge discovery" or "huge contribution" all by itself and every single scientist to have made some great discoveries... In reality almost noone's thesis is something truly special. Mostly it is just a summary of very routine simple work. I "love" how all people who are far from academia like to imagine that science is still done by lone geniuses, and that every step is some "revolutionary discovery". And if you fail to live up to that ridiculous standards, a lot of people will claim "you are not a real scientist". In reality it is all about having huge lab, with many trained people, expensive equipment and good financing. And almost all work is slow process of incrementally accumulating new facts bit by bit

Most Ph.D. Thesis in physics involves disproving someone else's theories. Even DeGrasse Tyson makes that clear in his introductory quote.

”So I became an expert i galaxies” 5 seconds in and the stakes are high..

Love this! Brief, calmly presented, and the projector really took me back..

This goes to show that science is a cooperative effort. 99+ % of professional scientists never make a name for themselves and are never mentioned in the history books. Fame is really hit or miss, but every one who becomes well known owes a great debt to all those who do the work. Neil found his niche as a communicator, and you also have a talent for that.

Everything about this journey, getting a copy of the thesis, understanding the thesis and then making a video so others can follow is remarkable. Young Ms you are brilliant. Thank you for a wonderful lesson.

Seems like a solid piece of work to me, thanks Tibees, for elaborating .:. I remember that time with my own thesis, an average thesis at best, but the hardest time ever in my life. Everything after seemed easy and, like Neil, I decided to pursue something very different. Somehow he learned to give the journalists the kind of language and story telling they wanted and he became the first person they would call whenever something spacey happened.

Thanks @Tibees it's so great to see such a carefully thought-out and worded video.

While we justly celebrate the handful of geniuses who make profound breakthroughs in science and change the game, the meat and potatoes of science are the thousands of dedicated people who do the kind of work that Tyson did for his PhD. Without an abundance of such work, the supergeniuses would have nothing to make breakthroughs with. Most scientists know that they will labour in relative anonymity, their work known to only a handful of colleagues in their field. They do their work out of love for it, not just to become bigshots. However, Tyson did become a sort of bigshot in a particular specialty: science communication and popularization. It's a crucial job, since without it, we would not get any scientists at all. Someone has to inspire that kid with a backyard telescope to pursue their dream of becoming an astronomer, or that other kid with a butterfly collection to become a biologist. Few people have the necessary skill for this, and we should respect that skill. Really good ones don't show up very often. Isaac Asimov's thesis was so lame an item that it garnered a grand total of two citations, and his career as a researcher was nothing remarkable --- yet when he died, there were headline obituaries in every major newspaper in the world, with good reason.

Great to see you still putting out content, Tibees. You continue to be an inspiration.

Thank you for this information. I am an amateur astronomer that is wanting to get into professional, scientific research. I have spent months trying to learn about many of these things and seeing Neil discuss his specific research is exactly the details I’ve been looking for. Someone who is reporting exact observations with tools I understand how to use. I can’t wait to comb through his entire thesis to start coming up with observations of my own to start working on. I can’t wait to go back to school to start putting my work into practice!

This is the first time I came across your channel. It sounds like you are constantly trying to hypnotize me with how soothing your voice is.

Merci Tibee for bringing all these remarkable works and explaining it.

Fundamental to science communication is knowing the science so you can communicate it. Tyson obviously did some quality science. Just successfully competing for observation time at a world-class observatory puts you in an elite class of astronomers and astrophysicists. He built a solid foundation for his future success as a science communicator where he has excelled.

The video was a pleasure to watch. You have a lovely voice and communicate so clearly.

I've had a passion to learn history my whole life, absolutely dreaded math and tried to understand science. Listening to your soft voice explain complex topics is a great way to wind down and still learn. Thank you

This video is SO GOOD! Thank you Tibees for quick walk-through of NDT's PhD thesis -- and interesting enough, his academic career!

Kudos to you for your deep dive in Tyson's research and communicating to the world in under 15 minutes!

Wow. You took that whole thesis and presented it in a way even i can understand. You're amazing. Thank you!

I really enjoy how soft your voice is! the science is billiant and its super easy listening (even though the material is very complex). Thank you Tibees! I will be coming back :)

Tyson is not famous for being a good physicist. I mean, I'm sure he's pretty good. Good enough that he got a PhD, while I dropped the major as an undergrad. And he was good enough to get the positions that lead to his rise in the field where he actually shines, science communication. But he'll tell anyone who mentions his wife that she's the better scientist in their marriage by far and anyone who knows them both seems to agree.

Thank you Toby. That was very well explained and easy to listen to. Clear, concise and nicely paced. It makes a change from many creators who seem intent on ramming as much information down your throat in as short a time as possible. Subbed.

Many thanks for your diligent study of NdGT's PHd Thesis and for communicating it so clearly!

Enjoyed the narrative reading on a very difficult subject. You are super smart and a tranquil beauty....your voice is hypnotic.

loving your creative ideas and content! keep it up :)

When I was in high school I started watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos and got hooked. The thing I love about science is we build on our knowledge over time on what others have learned before us. I think for this very reason this is what makes us shine.

That video is some good work! It takes a team of professionals to do what you do, well done

I started a PhD 4x : first I had a stipend but then dropped it to take a job (typical working class decision as I later learned). then twice during my work but both times simply the topic was not good enough to keep me up and I lacked the will. Finally then I did the most difficult one, going for a PhD in Britain next to my job as a managing partner and I finished successfully. it helped that the topic was close to my work and kept me interested... never regretted it

You are brilliant for dissecting this and explaining it to the common person like myself to get a basic understanding of his PhD thesis. Thank you.

I could listen to you for hours... and, I actually do! Keep up the great work explaining these complex ideas such that I can understand!!

Thanks a bunch Tibees. Keep up the great work.

I never had the opportunity for much education. Videos like your are so important to me and are a great source of learning and pleasure. Thank so much.

Crazy how different the "Top Comments" are, from a year ago, to "Newest First" comments, today, that show how poorly NDT's public perception is. He's the worst.

In summary I have learnt that: 1) He is a legit physicist earning a doctorate in a solid field of study from a reputable university 2) He fought to acheive it and it didn't come easy 3) He is a special teacher who can connect to the common man. This is his greatest ability.

I loved this video, thank you Tibees!!

Many thanks for the great review. The internet definitely needs more like them! 👍🏻

Neils work in science communication is stellar, it is interesting to see what he did do in academia but I don't think it's the main focus of his career.

Incredible information, thank for sharing the content. Greetings from Texas, thoroughly enjoy the channel.

This is very interesting. Thank you for making this video.

this is very relaxing to watch. Thank you

Very well put forth! It is true Neil deGrasse Tyson is an excellent communicator. I don't even have a college degree but I've always been curious about the universe and all the workings thereof. When I listen to him I can fathom it, I can imagine it and some of it actually makes sense to me. Thank you so much for sharing!

Thanks Tibees for another fine, informational video. Glad I help sponsor you. 🙂

I like how you break it down. Great video 🙂

This is just wonderful poetry. I don't know why I haven't been commenting... It's just, it's so indulgent... It's just, it's such a music and so cerebral... These videos are so outstanding it is challenging to adequately compliment them.

Wow 360 pages... whew!! Thanks Toby for giving a glimpse of Neil's work. I didn't understood much of it. I appreciate the philosophy of not worshipping, but understanding the work of creators. Respect for engineers who build the telescope in Chile to give us sneak peak into the galaxy.

I'd never really looked that closely at his published work before, but I've always heard that for someone of his renown, he has a relatively small number of publications. It was interesting to see, though, that his co-author on his first paper was a collaborator I worked with frequently throughout the years. While one astronomer of his acknowledgments in his dissertation was another frequent collaborator. I wonder if they have any stories about him, but I haven't really spoken to either of them in some time.

Super! Great video, Tibees!

Fascinating and well done. Thanks!

Since it’s perfectly possible to fantasize that I might read such a document under an extreme of duress I can’t imagine at the moment….thank you so much!

The in-thumbnail title got me

Thank you for your time and explanation from a commoner.

Nice effort!! Looking forward to your video on Michio Kaku😉

Exellent video. Asmr voice, simple pitching, straight to the point. Love it.

Thank you, I am also an Astrophysicist without a PhD and I agree with you. Hence maybe writing some better software to model and track objects might be a better idea. Maybe work on geometry or particle physics. Maybe E&M and its relationship with the quasars and filaments.

You are amazing..hope you go far.

Wow, lot of research. Nice one Tibees!

As someone who has a PhD (in economics), who then spent a number of years in academia before moving into consulting, a PhD is like a preparation for a career in academia, where you learn about the process of doing research and most importantly authoring papers capable of being published in refereed journals. It's like an entry test for becoming a university lecturer/academic. It's both a challenging and a rewarding experience where the relationship between student and superviser is paramount. When you get through your viva/defence examination, the sense of achievement is tremendous. You'll have it for the rest of your life.

I love this video! My understanding of any of any of this pale in comparison to you. And obviously Niel's. But I love learning from you guys/gals. You are the unsung heroes of our generation. Keep up the good work and keep the science coming!

Thank you for such a calming voice while you teach. So relaxing

From the first line of his intro, I'm glad Dr. Tyson was not totally discouraged from academia. Skilled communication of science is underrated.

Your voice is amazing. Love listening to it and learning at the same time 🍀

this was wonderful, clear, and delightful to watch!!

I’m so glad I found this. Thank you ~

I was hanging out for an hour one afternoon with the director of my research lab when he took a call from someone inquiring about taking a Ph.D there. Of course, I only heard one side of the conversation, and I don't recall most of that. But what's stuck with me, to this day, is the observation that "A Ph.D is an exercise in depth, not breadth." This is an important and sobering observation. We'd all love to be at the point of synthesis, right? When everything comes together and all the fragments of (OMG, perhaps interdisciplinary!) knowledge finally make harmonious sense when seen as a whole. But that's not what a Ph.D is for. It's for showing that you have the perseverance to dig deeply into a subject and find a small nugget of pure truth, or anyway as pure and enduring as we know how to refine it. It's not a place for grand epiphanies. Such epiphanies do take place, but seldom according to plan, and rarely when working toward a graduate degree. It's not that the sand has already been sifted by generations before you. There is, in fact, still much unknown terrain. But we simply don't have enough experience to engage in synthesis of any significance at the beginning of our careers. At least, the rare few who manage to do this seem to more or less step into the moment, in the same way that Newton and Leibniz arrived at the idea of calculus at nearly the same moment. The ideas were already being developed all around them. They just happened to be the first to see it. I didn't particularly like hearing that graduate work is an exercise in depth, not breadth. But that is, evidently, the way the system works best. And because NDT likewise made his contribution, in his turn, in that spirit, it may not rock your socks off. In fact, it may only make sense to his thesis committee and a handful of others. That's depth for you. But what an excellent preparation it was, nevertheless, for someone who chose to make science more available to the public! You rarely earn tenure this way, but its importance can't be overstated.

There are Ten thousands of PHD on Astrophysics at Least in the world. NDT wasn't famous because he Impacted the science of physics as the medias trying to make us believe. It's simply because of his methods of explaining complicated things with manner that everyone could understand, like his Documentaries

Thank you. Solid content that makes me a little bit smarter. Excellent.

It’s been ages since I have seen someone use an overhead projector. Props to you!

Hi I found myself accidentally on this site and just had to see why someone would take an interest in the details of NDT's thesis. It is a fine piece of practical research work that adds to the base of understanding of our and other galactic systems. In the end though it is "just another" spectroscopic survey of galactic stars, (something that by no means, I am quick to add, represents a trivial level of observational labour.) As reader Springer notes below, physics students that don't quite reach the sophistication to do particle, nuclear or condensed matter work often get offered astronomy as way to make their contribution as scientists. So while there are and have been very powerful minds ( Eddington come to mind, for one) who undertake "astrophysics" out of shear love of the literally cosmic scale problems, fresh interpretations of the "physics in the sky" most often must come from the fundamental physics side alluded to. NDT in particular seems to me a chap who has done PhD level slugging to earn his rank, but has found his best calling after all as a popularizer. Not many doctorates find themselves to be scientific ground breakers, and find satisfaction in other creative ways. best regards, D. Barillari

I'm about to start a Bachelor's Degree program in Metallurgical Engineering off the back of a Trade School degree in Welding and Fabrication Technology. I was the worst student ever when I was younger, spent 10 years working low skill jobs until I saved up enough to go back to school. I have tons of respect for people who can excel in their fields of science, I can't seem to learn without getting my hands on things.

Very great explanation..and lovely as well

😮😮thanks for providing me a video that put me to sleep. You have a nice voice and your subject was above my head. Dr. Tyson keeps me awake when he speaks.

I think you indeed put in lot of hard work to understand his thesis and then explain it in more simpler layman's language. I didn't understand everything but enough to appreciate what Tyson actually did. Thank you very much

To my mind, deGrasse Tyson never really recovered from getting KO'd by Buster Douglas. He went off the rails a bit after that. Oh well, we've still got the old videos and his PhD thesis I suppose.

Very nicely done! You got the science right and explained it well. Thanks

Great video. Thank you 😊

This is awesome 👏🏽

I hear a lot of what I see as undeserved criticism towards NDT that follows a similar pattern from scientifically literate people . Id like to explain my view on where this may come from and why I think the criticism is undeserved. Most of his science communication is aimed at the american general public, a group that tends to know very little about science. NDT is very good at explaining interesting science topics to this audience in a way that communicates how exciting science can be. When someone working in a STEM field or is otherwise pretty scientifically literate sees NDTs content, they may see it as just communicating ideas that are obvious, simple, needing no explanation, etc. because theyve already learned the vast majority of what he is explaining, if not all of it. An average scientifically illiterate american has likely forgotten just about all the chemistry, biology, physics, math, etc. that they've ever learned. Many simply never learned what they should have in school in the first place. So when NDT has a video explaining the properties of water, the lunar cycle, the scale of the solar system etc., many scientifically literate people may see it as being devoid of valuable information because they already know all the building blocks that make up the concepts like avagadros number, newtonian physics, fundamental forces, etc. The value of NDTs content isnt the facts themselves. Anyone can easily google the scale of the solar system, or what the definition of a planet is, or what the properties of water are. This information isnt anything unique. The purpose of NDTs content isnt to teach high-level astrophysics to working scientists and straight A STEM students, its to reach that person that made Cs in all their science courses in high school and thought their teachers were boring. To take what curiosity they have left and reignite it, to show them how interesting science can be. Going to NDT and complaining that he doesnt teach complex enough subjects, his lessons are no-brainers, etc. is like walking into a middle school algebra class at a public school and complaining that what they are doing is too basic and the teacher is overrated bacause theyre just teaching algebra and not vector calculus. The teacher may or may not be great at making new discoveries in or teaching vector calculus, but their goal is to teach algebra to middle schoolers so that criticism is pretty irrelevant. Its also important to remember that being a great academic scientist and being a great science communicator to the public are different skills. Ive had professors that have good academic reputations when publishing literature that are bad at teaching concepts to students, as well as professors that dont seem particularly accomplished academically but are great at teaching to students.

Thanks for covering this

Great review👍🏿👍🏿

This was quite enjoyable to watch and listen to. Really interesting. The Universe’s research ability is as never-ending as those outer arms.

I love your videos❤️❤️🌹

@tibees, You did a great job , Thank You.

This review will give a lot of graduate students hope that they can also produce a Ph.D. thesis paper.

Love these retrospectives :) PS 2000 citations of a thesis sounds pretty sensational to me!

Your voice is so soothing ❤️

Thank you for shaking up minds.

He's an expert at sounding like he knows what he's talking about.

The way it was explained to me is that the point of your masters is to learn how to properly ask a question and the PHD is to learn how to properly answer a question. The undergraduate is where you gain the knowledge to be able to do the previous two things.

I love the projector scenes

Thank you for this!

When I was in school for math I looked up how long it often took to get a PhD in Math/Physics: It can take 5-7 *years* to complete the research for a Physics PhD. It has likely gotten worse

Say what you like but when he said “the science on global warming is finished” he lost me. I like the guy but any scientist willing to say that knowing full well the science is in its rudimentary stages and it’s ability to predict is negligible. He clung to his politics and not science.

I subscribed! That was awesome!

I appreciate the old school projector drawings over computer graphics. Nice warm and familiar throwback :)

I was quite surprised that he did not thank Carl Sagan in his thesis for being an early mentor as Neil recounted in his newer version of Cosmos. Either way, I have much gratitude to them both.