1
Somewhere
in time's own space,
there must be some
sweet pasture place
where creeks sing on,
and tall trees grow.
Some paradise
where horses go.
For the love that guides my pen,
I know that great
horses live again.
In the grand adventure of life,
there's nowhere I
feel more at home,
more at peace,
than with my horses.
The horse is a symbol
of human progress.
The unsung hero
whose power carried us
into the modern age,
plowing our fields,
building our cities.
It was on horseback
that we set out
to explore the world.
Beautiful boy.
The horses teach you
to live in the moment
and by some nonverbal way,
whether it's the way they look,
the way their body moves,
they're communicating.
What a sweetheart.
That's the first time
I've touched her.
Ah, a whole new thing.
How they feel, what they think.
And they're reading
you in the same way.
This is where the
horses are bred,
babies grown up and
they begin their life.
So the baby dives into life,
and I've been there
at that moment
when the baby looks around,
and I was the first
thing the baby saw.
I was brought to tears
by the experience
because it was
seeing a life form,
seeing the world
for the first time.
It's that connectivity
that fascinates me.
From the point of the stars,
the galaxies,
the star dust of
which we are made,
nature is magical
in its connection.
We're all connected
to the stars,
to the earth,
to the horses.
T-minus ten, nine,
eight, seven, six, five,
three, two, one, zero,
and lift off of the
Space Shuttle Atlantis
on a mission to build,
resupply, and to do research
on The International
Space Station.
Houston now controlling,
Atlantis begins its penultimate
journey to shore up.
The International Space Station.
We humans are
naturally born dreamers.
We have an innate curiosity
for the deep mysteries of life.
What is our reason for being?
What is out there?
Are we alone?
Dreams are at the intersection
of science fiction
and science fact.
They inspired the creators
of Star Trek, too.
Imagine a future three
centuries from now
where we have developed
the technology
and the know how
to explore and colonize
distant galaxies.
How much of that is fantasy?
How much will actually
come to pass,
and
how is it possible for
something like Star Trek
to illuminate a
path to the future?
My name is William Shatner
and this is a voyage
to probe the most brilliant
and creative minds
on the planet to find out if.
The Truth Is In The Stars.
More than a half a century ago,
I started traveling
through the stars
in the 23rd Century,
exploring the galaxies,
discovering new
worlds and alien life.
Yes, boldly going where
no one had gone before.
So, you would think that
as captain of the USS
Starship Enterprise,
that I would know
everything there is to know
about the mysteries
of the universe.
But so many of my questions
remain unanswered.
The vast expanse
of the universe,
dark,
mysterious,
stretching off into infinity.
How did it begin?
Where's it going?
How will it end?
Good evening,
ladies and gentlemen.
From the Meridian Room
in The Park Plaza Hotel
in New York City,
we bring you the
music of Ramon...
Science Fiction
has long been a part of
our entertainment culture.
When Orson Welles
frightened a nation in 1938
with his broadcast
of War of the Worlds
the imagined future was
dark and foreboding.
Ladies and gentlemen,
I have a grave
announcement to make.
Incredible as it may seem,
both the observations of science
and the evidence of our eyes
lead to the
inescapable assumption
that those strange beings
who landed in the Jersey
farmlands tonight
are the vanguard of
an invading army
from the planet Mars.
Bringing the news of the world
for millions of readers.
The Martian invasion
was all imagined,
but The Second World War
and The Cold War that followed
indoctrinated a sense of fear.
Here they are on
their way to school
on a beautiful spring day,
but no matter where they go
or what they do,
they aways try to
remember what to do
if the atom bomb
explodes right then.
It's a bomb, duck and cover!
But The Cold War
was about to take a new turn.
The race to space had begun.
And this generation
does not intend
to founder in the backwash
of the coming age of space.
The countdown is
once again underway
at Cape Canaveral,
in the attempt to launch
astronaut John Glenn
into orbit around the world.
For the eyes of the world
now look into space,
to the moon
and to the planets beyond,
and we have vowed
that we shall not
see it governed
by a hostile flag of conquest,
but by a banner of freedom
and peace.
We have vowed that we...
Sensing this renewed optimism,
a screenwriter by the
name of Gene Roddenberry
developed a concept
that would transform
science fiction.
Space, the final frontier.
When Star Trek
premiered in 1966,
it envisioned a promising
and hopeful future
where the world was
united in a peaceful quest
to explore the universe.
To boldly go where no
man has gone before.
Star Trek has fundamentally
altered the course of my life,
but I could never have guessed
how it could influence
so many other lives
and inspire people
to literally reach
for the stars.
Sulu, activate Tractor Beams.
Tractor Beams activated.
We have it, sir.
Try to bring it aboard
the hangar deck.
Aye, sir.
Lieutenant Uhura,
send a security team
to the pressure doors
on the hangar deck.
Aye sir.
Mr. Spock, come
with me, Scotty.
Hangar doors opened
and preparing for entrance
of shuttlecraft.
Shuttlecraft approaching
hangar deck.
Bridge to Captain Kirk.
Kirk here.
Hangar doors are closed
and hangar deck is pressurizing.
Acknowledged.
Evening, sir, do you
have a ticket, sir?
I... I need a ticket?
Yeah, you need a ticket, sir!
I'm uh, I'm the guy that
played Captain Kirk.
Really?
I still need a ticket?
Yeah.
Wow.
If you can believe it.
Hello, Captain.
More than 50 years later,
Star Trek still
captures the imagination.
All these fans,
and I'm about to meet
one of the biggest
Trekkies of them all.
The actual Gorn head.
- Is it really?
- That's what they say.
I thought it-it was tearing
at me with its teeth.
Does it look familiar?
Yeah, well, it was
a hot desert day.
Yes, at Vasquez Rocks, right?
Vasquez Rocks, exactly.
Right. Yes.
He was a powerful guy
back then, in that suit.
Yeah, there was some
great-great wrestling
that happened in that
and that's his outfit.
Now this is supposedly
the laurel wreath
that you wore in
Plato's Stepchildren.
Why do you say supposedly?
Well, it's all been verified,
but, you know,
I have to believe the people
who I gave the money to
that this is all real
because the auction...
- You have to believe that.
- It has to be real.
Right, it has to be real.
But maybe you
can be the final...
Oh, that looks real
to me, certainly.
So this is what you wore for
the first interracial kiss
on television.
- Fantastic.
- Yeah.
Then over here
is, uh, the jumpsuit
from What Are Little
Girls Made Of?
- When you get spun into...
- Oh, yeah.
The android.
Now that looks really real,
that's the material.
It looks like that
could fit you, right?
- Yeah, yeah.
- Yeah, that's it.
No, but seriously though,
it's cool to see you
- looking good.
- If I suck it in I guess but...
- That's-that's incredible.
- That's it!
Isn't that cool?
Ben, yeah the
whole thing is cool!
And-and were
you, uh,
were you born with
this in your mouth?
This is the silver spoon
that I was born with,
that's right.
The original one was a
little bit bigger, actually.
- That's great, Ben.
- Okay.
These auctions started
to happen, right,
where props from movies
and television shows
would become available,
and so the idea of
having a piece of the real
thing that, you know,
and of course, you know,
the artifice of it all
is so interesting,
that it's all kind of, you know,
cardboard and paint,
and all these things
that, you know,
but they mean so much
to you as a kid,
when you're watching them
because it's so real to you.
So, what do you
think you're doing
- when you're buying that?
- Yeah, yeah.
I mean, you're
spending real money
uh, for a piece of cardboard.
What-what-what do you
think you're doing?
Just solidifying my
status as a nerd,
is like probably the
biggest part of it.
I don't think you need to...
Well, that's what,
once-once you've done that,
and you've committed
that kind of money to getting,
you're saying basically,
- that's what I am.
- You're basically a nerd.
- Yes.
- Okay.
You know, the idea, to me,
it's just that idea of having
touching the real
thing or something,
that is actually,
that was actually there,
a piece of history, in a way.
Did this um,
intrigue your imagination?
Did this make you
think in those terms?
Yeah, I mean, it was
more than intriguing.
I mean, it was kind of one of
those shows where it was like,
wow, this is the coolest thing.
I love this.
I started going to conventions
and um, you know,
but I don't know if you know,
like you don't analyze it
when you're at that age.
I think, you know, there are
movies and television shows
that you see at a young
age that have an impact,
and then they either stay
with you later, or they don't,
but they're never
gonna affect you
like they affect you at that age
and I think that's
part of it, too.
This is Star Trek's
50th anniversary.
So, it's 50 years
since I was, uh,
playing the part.
From my vantage point,
50 years later,
I don't know where
it went, I mean,
uh, and-and-and
it's both
appalling and, uh,
and intriguing
when somebody looks
at me and says,
you know, uh,
"Are you...
Are you
Captain Kirk?"
Thinking of me 50 years ago.
I've talked to, uh,
quite a few people about time.
About the passage of
time and how time goes,
- of course...
- Fascinating, isn't it?
It is.
Have you talked
about the phenomenon
of time going
faster as you get older?
Feeling that time...
Tell me about that.
Just the feeling that time
goes by quicker
as you get older.
They find that
time does slow down
as you approach the
speed of light,
did you know that?
I've heard that.
Well, they've proven
that if you could go
at the speed of light somewhere,
time would cease to exist.
And, would-would aging,
then, slow?
- You'd stop aging!
- Right.
Now, I don't know
how that works,
'cause then when you come back,
uh, the Earth would've
gone on around the Sun
that many times and
you would not have.
So you'd be your age,
and-and your kids would
be your age as well.
I stopped understanding
what you were saying about
30 seconds ago.
I have to be honest.
Most people find that, no
matter what the subject is,
that's the problem.
If we could travel at
the speed of light,
we could reach the planet
Jupiter in just 43 minutes.
NASA's Juno Spacecraft
is already there,
probing the moons of the planet
for signs of life in the
vast oceans of liquid water
beneath their icy crusts.
Clues, perhaps,
to life on earth,
and the origins of
our Solar System,
these baby steps to the stars
have been inspired
by Science Fiction.
But what role
did Star Trek play?
Talk to me about
scientific curiosity.
Oh, I will!
When you take any child,
three year old, five year old,
six years old,
and watch them wander around
and explore the world,
it's all about
being a scientist.
They see something.
They touch it,
they taste it, they poke it.
So now that's my attitude.
That's wonderful,
and does science fiction
have anything to do with that?
Oh, 100%.
My mom was a huge
science fiction fan.
We watched Star Trek
all the time!
No, kidding!
Oh, yeah, she freaked
out when I told her
I got to meet you.
Oh, my gosh!
Completely passed out.
And did you-were you
intrigued by science fiction
and Star Trek?
Absolutely, 100%.
A lot of engineers
and scientists
who work here are big
science fiction fans,
that's kinda how we got our
start when we were young
and the-the idea
that Europa might have
a huge ocean of water
beneath that ice cap,
we can,
we can think about it
in a practical way.
Okay, maybe all the
elements of life are there,
maybe there's
microorganisms there,
but we just can't help
that little piece in the
back of our head that says.
"Maybe there's underwater
cities there!"
It's just an extra little
spark of coolness
- to go and explore.
- Oh, how wonderful.
So sort of a science fiction
version of science fact.
That's right!
Oh, that's wild!
I love it!
But one of the reasons I am
an engineer in this business
is because we get to
support the scientists
who dream up these questions
that they wanna know
about the world
and we can help them go
get the data they need...
Okay, so tell me how that works.
It's that-that
spirit of
discovery, of exploration,
of always knowing you
can go out looking
and there's going to be
something fascinating
just over the next horizon.
Uh, the idea, I think too,
that I get from Star Trek
is that,
so many of the surprises
were good ones,
and even when there
were surprises that were
dangerous for the crew,
or dangerous for people,
there was always a way
to-to work out a solution
so that things were
okay in the end.
System this is NASA.
All stations on Juno coord,
we have the tone for
burn cutoff on Delta B.
Juno, welcome to Jupiter.
Science fiction and science fact
are constantly playing
off of each other.
We need people imagining
the future of
scientific exploration,
the future of human exploration,
and that's the role
of-of science fiction,
uh, writers and actors
and futurists.
We need that kind of imagination
in order to come up with
ideas for what we can do
to actually explore
our solar system.
Star Trek was an optimistic
view of what we could do
if we put our minds to
international collaboration.
To putting down the conflict
between our governments
and just collaborating
on an individual level
among people whose
goals were just to
understand things that we
didn't understand yet.
I think that Star Trek
wasn't necessarily
a reflection of
what was going on,
but it was an expression of hope
of what could go
on in the future.
I think because we were one of
the first shows that came along
that said,
hey, there is a tomorrow,
and-and not only that, but, uh,
we've just begun
to invent things.
We've just begun to explore
and we're a young race,
we're just getting started,
and I think everyone
of a young mind
has got to believe that,
that wow, science fiction is,
is just really
philosophy in motion.
No, it's fine, you'll be fine.
Whoopi Goldberg is an actor
who has similarly been inspired
by Gene Roddenberry's
vision of the future.
Playing a character, who,
having lived for centuries,
was able to dispense
enormous wisdom
to those willing to listen,
Hi, Bill.
I wonder if she has any insights
into immortality.
Whoopi.
Yes, Bill.
My darling,
I'd love to hold onto
something permanent.
Well, the only thing you
got is what you've done,
and now we have the ability
to hold onto films and
television that was made,
so we gain immortality
as performers.
Would you be interested in
living immortally, for example?
I'd like to stay
for at least 140,
I'd commit to that.
A hundred, you mean
live to 140 years?
Yeah!
I wanna see it!
- And-and see what happens?
- Yeah!
Well, that's...
That's the...
That's the job of science
fiction, isn't it?
Not anymore!
And you started all of this.
Everything rolls
back to Star Trek.
I'm just telling you that.
Gene created this show,
and messed everybody's head up,
and it's gone on for 50,
what, 50 years?
When Star Trek first came on,
and Nichelle Nichols was there
as the Communications Officer,
it was the first time
anyone in the world
was aware that people of color
would be in the future
because before Star Trek,
in every sci-fi movie,
we don't exist there.
So, for me,
it was a signal to say,
"No, no, you're in the future,
and this is what you
have to look forward to."
So, when they did, uh,
Next Generation,
and I went and said to Gene,
Can I be on the show?
And he said,
"Why?"
I said, "Because",
I wanna be that for
some little girl."
One juice.
You aren't like the
other grownups.
Oh, no?
They don't think
Isabella's real.
Well, most grownups
have a hard time
with things they can't see.
Whoopi, one more question
before I let you go,
and that has to do with art,
and creativity,
and its place in the world.
What do we know about art?
We know that people
who don't have art
in their lives
don't have as rich a
life as they could.
That's why the cavemen...
Cavemen painted,
and cavewomen
painted stuff on the wall
and it made it look nice,
made it feel homey.
You know,
we can't live without art.
We can't live without theory,
we can't live
without creativity.
It just doesn't work for us
as a-as a race of humans.
Human beings make art.
Right.
I'm pretty sure it's just us,
but you know,
who knows what's
out in the universe?
There might be other
beings making art.
I think cats make art,
but they don't tell ya!
My quest for knowledge
will ultimately lead me
to one of the great
geniuses of modern science,
Stephen Hawking.
It's once in a
lifetime opportunity
to ask the big questions,
so I must be prepared.
On the edge of Central Park
sits the Hayden Planetarium.
I've come here
to see the world
renowned astrophysicist
Neil deGrasse Tyson,
who is also
host of the television
series Cosmos.
All too often,
people like dividing the kingdom
of human thought.
"Well, you're an artist,"
but you're not a scientist.
"You're a scientist,
you're not an artist."
When I think of science fiction,
I think of the juxtaposition
of all branches of civilization.
I think if you're gonna take
your civilization into space,
you gotta organize that,
you need the engineers,
the scientist,
you need the artists
have to imagine that.
And it may be
that what comes out
of that collaboration
is the only future any of
us should be striving for
and that's one of
peace and harmony,
and one where we can celebrate
the discoveries of
science and technology
and how art makes it tasty.
Star Trek,
and frequently is referred to
by a lot of people
in the sciences as
being an inspiration,
that when they were kids,
uh-uh, and it stirred
their imagination.
Did Star Trek have
anything to do
with you in that way?
As a kid
you're not thinking
complex sociological thoughts,
you just do what feels good.
You play in your sandbox.
My sandbox
was an interest in the universe,
and I wasn't thinkin'
about much else.
And then I'd walk
out into the street,
and then I'd hear
some racial epithet
yelled out of a fast moving car.
I said,
"Oh, I'm also black."
The world outside my telescope
was not really
ready to accept me.
Science fiction world?
The science fiction world was.
And Star Trek
reflected all that?
Yes, in the 1960s
we had a Cold War
with the Soviet Union,
and a hot war in Southeast Asia,
and the civil rights movement,
and here's Star Trek portraying.
Earth,
where all the countries of
the world were at peace.
Who makes tomorrow come,
if not the dreamers
and the scientists and the
technologists who enable it?
So, this is an occasion
to not feel separate from life,
but to feel one.
How does entanglement
enter into that?
And tell me what
entanglement is.
It's a...
So, uh, quantum physics is a,
it's a spooky branch
of the physical universe.
I say spooky only because
we have the power to predict
exactly what's gonna happen.
Entanglement is one
of these things.
You can have,
each particle is also a wave.
What does that mean?
Doesn't make sense, does it?
- No.
- Get over it.
The universe is
under no obligation
to make sense to you.
Stardust,
and you and I are all entangled.
We're all one.
We are composed of stardust.
We have an iron
meteorite downstairs,
and if you take all the iron
in the hemoglobin
of every living human,
and put it together as one mass,
you would get a hunk of iron
the size of that meteorite.
So, we have an iron kinship
with one another
and that meteorite,
because we all have the
same point of origin.
That's a gift of modern
astrophysics to civilization,
to realize the oneness we have
with one another biologically,
with the earth chemically,
and with the
universe atomically.
Occasionally people ask me,
what do I... what do I think
the future will bring?
And I say no,
I don't know if I'm the
best person for that.
And they say,
"Well, why not?"
And I just,
all I do is tell 'em
about Star Trek,
and I remember as a kid,
and I said, okay, warpdrives,
I'm good with that
for the future.
A little card you put
in a box to get data,
I'm good with that,
but those doors that open up
just by walking towards them?
That'll never happen!
Somehow I was in
complete denial...
No, it was real!
Of-of automatically
opening doors.
That's hysterical.
And I said we will never have
that for-for a millennium.
That's the fantasy.
The reality is,
there was a guy hidden
behind that door
with a little peephole,
here he comes,
and every so often
that guy fell asleep,
and I'd hit the door
that wouldn't open.
Captain's Log,
Stardate 8169.7,
The Enterprise has just
discovered a strange new planet
in the Gammafallopia
Star System.
Hi, I'm William Shatner,
my car broke down
while I was on my way
to give a speech about how
TV keeps families together.
You might ask how Family Guy
is connected to my
quest for enlightenment.
I love schnitzel.
Well, apart from doing a
brilliant sendup of me...
Oh, my God, I hit
William Shatner!
Light growing dimmer,
can't breathe.
Beam me up, God.
Producer Seth MacFarlane
is also responsible
for reviving Cosmos,
the number one science
show on television.
If I give him a sandwich
maybe he'll be nice to me.
Yeah, are ya hungry?
Uh, you know, I just ate,
but I can eat again for you.
The ultimate sacrifice.
Exactly!
Look, I-I can't believe
what I'm lookin' at.
Yeah, this is, um,
the infamous bowl of spaceships.
That's the one I was on!
It's amazing, we were talking
about this yesterday,
what a brilliant
design this was.
This whole thing is novel!
It's so simple,
its silhouette is
instantly identifiable.
It's a very underratedly
brilliant piece of design.
You know, one of the
reasons I got into TV
was because of the
small character stories,
the morality plays
that you guys did and
the characters never
set those phasers on
kill unless they had to,
and it affected me,
and it's the reason
that nowadays,
if I find a spider in my house,
I gotta catch it
and put it outside,
because Star Trek set out to
teach us that everything
has a right to exist.
Wow!
Until it screws up.
Then you kill it!
Then it's gone.
I'm fascinated by
the idea that you,
with your reputation of
animation and comedy
and outrageous comedy
suddenly veer into
producing Cosmos,
and you were instrumental
in reviving it
with the host of
Neil deGrasse Tyson.
It all goes back to
when I was a kid,
when I was a teenager,
I was in high school,
I had your show and
the show following,
to present an
optimistic view of,
which by the way,
is something that's
very lacking right now.
Science fiction has gotten
very, very dystopian.
A lot of people get their
science from entertainment,
and I wonder what that's doing.
I wonder what the absence
of that exciting, hopeful,
optimistic vision that
you guys presented,
without that I wonder what...
What-what's exciting
kids today
who are into that genre?
If you were going to go
to Dr. Stephen Hawking...
Mm-hmm.
What would you ask him?
I would say, what's
your best guess?
- At?
- That would be my question...
At everything,
and is there some
higher dimensional
uh, lens that we're
seeing our world through?
So, I would say to him,
with everything that you know,
and your knowledge
of mathematics
and quantum physics and such,
what-what-what is
your best guess
uh, as to the actual
physical nature of the universe?
And-and, uh,
and-and I'm
sure he would,
'cause he's a responsible guy,
I'm sure he would say,
"I have no fuckin' idea."
Okay, this may be the
greatest deli sandwich
you've ever had.
There's no way this is
gonna be all over my shirt?
Oh, my God.
Yeah, you know what we forgot?
We forgot napkins.
No, didn't forget that at all.
Your magic sack.
It goes on, it's endless!
I have a spaceship in there!
New York's Central Park
is an oasis of calm
in a hectic world.
An ideal place for
a conversation
on deeper subjects,
time, space,
and the mysteries
of the universe.
Michio Kaku is a renowned
futurist and
theoretical physicist.
Some say
he's pushing the boundaries
of modern physics,
dreaming in the realm
of science fiction.
I'm about to find out.
Michio.
- Ah, Mr. Shatner!
- How are you?
Great honor!
Bill, please, please.
So, I've asked
you to come here...
Yes.
Uh, in the park,
because all life is connected.
The religious philosophies by,
by people who lived
before technology,
they deduced intuitively
that everything was connected.
Many religions believe
that the universe is one.
Think of The Big Bang,
when the entire universe
came out of something
smaller than an electron.
Everything you see around us
was connected at the
instant of The Big Bang.
Oh!
And when the Bang took place,
we got separated,
but in some sense all
matter in the universe
has connection
with every other
piece of matter,
'cause we all came
from the same bang.
Well I love that idea.
The Big Bang is an-an
incredible concept
as to the beginning
of this universe.
I mean, nobody thought
of that before.
That's right.
See Einstein had the theory,
but The Big bang was
too much for him.
Nature has two hands.
One hand is a theory
they're very big.
The other theory is
the quantum theory.
The theory of little
tiny electrons.
But why should nature
have two hands
but you don't talk
to each other?
How can nature combine
the big with the small
into a single theory?
How?
That is the number one
problem in physics today.
That's the mystery!
Yeah, it's still a mystery,
we don't know.
The leading theory
is string theory.
We think the string
theory, in fact,
is the only candidate
which can meld the big and
the small into a single,
comprehensive theory that works.
I understand the English,
but the sense of it,
what does that mean?
Well, we think that ultimately,
particles are made out of
tiny vibrating strings.
From a distance they
look like a particle,
but up close they're
really vibrating strings.
The only paradigm of
nature that is rich enough
to explain this enormous variety
of things we see around us
is music!
Strings have many frequencies.
Each frequency corresponds
to a particle,
to a whole universe
of interactions.
And as it vibrates it
creates quantum mechanics,
all the quantum particles,
and as it moves in
space and time
it forces the stage
of life to curl up
exactly as Einstein predicted.
So in a very simple way,
we can combine both
Einstein's theory
and the quantum theory
and together they
comprise everything.
So the music of the
string is all the particles
and chemistry is
nothing but the melodies
you can play on these
vibrating strings.
I love what you're doing.
And then the universe is
a symphony of strings.
Ah!
These are the exact
quotes of Einstein.
He said he wanted to, quote,
"Read God's thoughts."
The leading candidate for
reading the mind of God
is cosmic music.
Cosmic music resonating
through eleven
dimensional hyperspace.
Wow, that's the theory
and that would go along
with the unifying idea
of everything is unified.
Right. That's right.
And you're looking to
prove what you just said,
- you're looking to prove that?
- That's right.
Oh, my Lord, I never
understood that!
- You got it!
- I got it!
- You got it!
- I got it, by God, I got it.
Star Trek has fundamentally
altered the course of my life
but I could never have guessed
how it could influence
so many other lives
and inspire people to innovate,
to create,
to literally reach
for the stars.
This is the space shuttle.
Enterprise,
with its name inspired
by Star Trek.
It was the prototype for
the shuttles that followed.
A giant step forward
in our ability to
reach for the stars.
But where exactly is
that quest taking us?
We're literally
at the crossroads
of science fiction and science.
Right.
And you are a pure scientist,
and I'm a pure ignoramus.
Nonsense.
So-so, there's,
I'm fictional, in every sense,
and you're pure science.
It's all about dreaming,
and science fiction,
although entertainment
is about dreaming and imagining,
and that is the most
powerful force that we know.
Until this moment I've
never fully understood
that the science you're in
is about dreaming the
possible, the what ifs.
But it's the what ifs
based on the knowledge
of scientific principles,
and science fiction
is also based on that,
- with a more elusive...
- Open minded.
- Open minded.
- Open minded.
Yes!
Where the possibilities
are less likely.
Right.
So science fiction illustrates,
perhaps better than anything,
the extraordinary power
of the human mind to do
much more than it knows
because the human mind dreams
of things before they happen.
Based on all this,
where do you think we'll be
in Star Trek's time,
250 years from now?
Anything-anything I say that
far ahead is bound to be wrong.
Of course.
What I know is that the quantum
technological
revolution is coming.
We know that the
devices we use today,
as awesome as they are,
laptops and cell phones,
will be abacuses ten
or 20 years from now.
We're going to have, I believe,
new sources of energy.
The dark matter in space,
the dark energy in space.
I think one day is
gonna be used-used.
That will allow us
to travel in space.
Where does Dr. Stephen
Hawking and you
as his,
uh, what would we call you?
- Collaborator.
- Collaborator?
Yes.
You, I mean, just be
mentioned in the same breath
is really phenomenal, isn't it?
For him!
But
where do you guys fit into this
phenomenal uh gallery of people?
I am inspired by Stephen.
His main contribution to physics
was to say we can unify
quantum theory with gravity
and let's try and do that,
we have to do that to
describe black holes,
we have to do that to
describe The Big Bang.
We're on the verge
of discovering it.
Is that string theory?
No.
We're on the verge
of discovering it,
it's not string theory.
String theory has become
a nightmare theory.
What we're finding
observationally
is that as we go
to bigger scales,
the universe simplifies,
and in a sense it's finite.
You know, we're taught...
We're used to talking
about an infinite universe,
but the part we will ever
see is actually finite
because of the dark energy.
So the dark energy
is causing the universe
to accelerate
its expansion away from us.
Stuff which is further than
a certain distance today
is going to travel
away from us so fast,
we will never see it.
- So here we are...
- Yes, yes, yes!
Human beings sticking our
fingers out to explore
like children
looking in the dirt.
Absolutely.
We're looking into the sky,
trying to find an answer.
What is the answer?
What is the question?
Why are we doing this?
What will we discover?
Will we discover the beginning?
Or how does this...
What are we doing?
It's who we are.
We are the leading
edge of evolution.
We arose in the...
We are the leading
edge of evolution.
We represent
the self-consciousness
of the universe.
This thing behind us
isn't thinking about
what's out there and
how does it work.
Through us it is.
Through us.
Through us it is.
We are the self-consciousness
of the universe.
Are you the leadings...
Are you the special forces
in the battle
to-for knowledge?
Absolutely, that is
what physics is.
Wow, you're the Green Berets
of-of education.
That's what the-that's
what physics is.
The Perimeter Institute
for Theoretical Physics.
This is where dreamers
like Stephen Hawking
are exploring
mind-bending ideas
about the nature
of our universe,
asking the what ifs.
What if we can bend
space and time?
What if we can control gravity?
What if we can peer
deep into a black hole?
What if we can harness
the power of dark energy?
What if we can travel faster
than the speed of light?
What if?
Mike Lazaridis,
you and your associates
invented the very
first smartphone.
What a thing to be able
to say because of the way
smartphones have
changed the world.
Not just our culture
but every culture.
You sell Blackberry
and you make a lot of money
and you use that money
in a philanthropic way.
You endow an institute
that you call Perimeter
and the object of that
money is pure research.
How do you get to that?
The lenses of our imagination
are the most powerful
optics you could ever imagine.
They're much more
powerful than our eyes,
they're much more powerful
than our instruments
because they allow
us to see things
that our instruments can't see
but can only interpret.
Everything that we
basically take for granted
in our industrial world and
our lives and our society
and our technology,
our industry,
all the wealth
creations come from
theoretical physics discoveries
that have explained
parts of nature.
Let me take you to this
really amazing place.
This is where we're
growing the future.
So this may appear
like science fiction
and in many ways it is.
But this is the kind
of technology you need
in order to invent the future
because you're dealing with
materials that you can't see.
We can grow materials,
keep them completely isolated
from impurities
and contamination,
and we can not
only grow them here
atom by atom,
layer by layer,
we can build completely
imaginative, new substances
that are gonna help us
define the quantum future.
Scientific discovery
and technology industry,
they change everything.
No matter how
wild-eyed we are,
we tend to, um,
underestimate the future
potential of a discovery,
of a physics discovery,
or a-a, you know,
technology discovery.
Physics is magic that works.
The universe
transcends the English language.
We simply don't have the words
to describe its magnitude.
But with mathematics,
scientists are able to
comprehend the universe
to see music in the stars,
and equations in its blackness.
It occurs to me that these
complex scientific theories
occupy an imaginative
realm much like magic.
As Kirk,
I explored the universe
unafraid of what surprises
lay beneath the black cloak
of human ignorance.
I've come back to
familiar surroundings
to meet with an actor
I directly inspired
and, oh, yes,
a slick hand at magic, too.
Where the magic is,
you have to believe
that it's there.
That's magic.
Magic is-is
merely saying,
"That can't be done"
and then you do it.
And when you first do it,
they go, "That's a great trick",
that's a great trick"
and then eventually, you go,
"Well, that thing
can be done."
The reason my wife doesn't
like magic, is she goes,
"It's not magical
if you can do it,
now it's just a thing,
it exists"
and I think, that's fascinating.
Let's create the illusion
of how it could be done,
and then that illusion
becomes your reality.
If I say to you
this coffee is hot,
when it's not,
and I believe it,
for me it's hot!
Your perception
is that it's hot.
When I was eight
or nine years old,
I discovered Star Trek,
and I became
immediately addicted,
and my addiction was specific,
I mean I love the whole thing,
but your work as Kirk
was so inspiring to me,
the idea of this guy
who was brilliant,
um, instinctual,
romantic,
masculine...
That's me!
This sense of humor,
where I went.
"That's what I wanna do."
Now what I really wanted to do
was pilot the Enterprise.
I didn't know that they were...
They were two different things,
but, that was the
beginning of my interest in
when watching you
through those episodes,
Kirk was always moving
through this galaxy,
this mission,
with a sense of awe.
The writers of Star Trek
had some brilliant ideas.
Yeah, they certainly
were able to articulate
the challenge
in a way that invited dialog.
The most powerful
episode you ever did
on which the,
the divide between peoples were,
they were one guy was
black on the right side,
and one guy was white
on the right side
and out of that was this enmity,
and this hostility,
and this death match
until they literally,
completely destroyed each other.
That was one of my
favorite episodes, too.
It's just brilliant.
You're coming back to
pay for your crimes!
And long after you
and I are gone,
people will watch
those episodes,
and they may seem kitschy
and they may seem outdated,
but the integrity that
you all brought to it
made it real for us,
and it left a mark.
You were on Star Trek.
Voyager, I made it to that one.
Voyager, yeah.
As you well know,
there is-there is a magic,
and especially if
you're a Star Trek fan,
to walking onto the ship
and they close the door
that gets you onto
the ship and now,
wherever you look,
you're on the ship!
I mean, if you look out a
window there's a starfield
and if you walk down a corridor
it leads to a real room.
That's why we go into acting.
There is one other individual
who rounds out our group.
An artificial intelligence.
The mind of a mathematician,
and the soul of an artist.
Take me
on this wonderful
journey you're taking me,
to a man like
Dr. Stephen Hawking.
If you were going to go see.
Dr. Stephen Hawking
in Cambridge,
what would you ask him?
The question that I
think is kinda fun, is,
"Why?"
I'm fascinated as to the
why of it all. Yeah.
If this is all purposed
in some way,
what is that purpose?
You know, how did
the universe begin,
Big Bang, I go, "Okay",
I'm with you, Big Bang."
The second before the Big Bang,
there was nothing,
and then suddenly
there was something?
Well, what was in the nothing?
What was in the nothing
that made the Big Bang?
What... If you keep
going back,
go back one more,
go back one more,
go back one more.
It leads me
to have to embrace
the idea of a Creator
that put the motion of
the universe into play.
That is why I have spirituality,
because I believe we
have an intended purpose
for existence in time and space.
How are ya?
So, are you guys
ready to go to Mars?
Absolutely.
Any time.
So, the first thing I
wanna point out is that
this is more than
just a panorama
you're fully tracked
so you can move...
This is real?
Yeah, this is all
made from real data.
I've skied in this area.
Yeah.
I welcome you to move
around in this space,
'cause what you're seeing
is a full 3-D world.
You have a beam coming
out of your eye.
Like a superhero.
That is so wild.
What's the Rover doing now?
I mean, these days,
what's it up to?
So, it's continuing to explore,
and one of the great
things about this tool is,
so, every time we get
new images of Mars,
the world round you will just
fill in with more and more data.
So our goal is to drive
about a third of the way
up that big mountain,
and 180 degrees around
in the other direction
180 degrees around
this direction is...
Yeah, so this is
remarkable here.
Yeah.
Do we know the
qualities of the soil?
Is it earth-like?
Can you get a corn
crop going there?
I think there's a
lot of radiation.
What Bill and Chris are
walking on is a sediment.
It's made of broken
bits of Mars' rock,
and so it's actually
not so alien,
because almost all of Mars' rock
is this volcanic
material called basalt.
It's the most common kind
of rock in the solar system.
We have it erupting in Hawaii
and Iceland right now.
It's all over the
surface of Venus.
It's all over the
surface of asteroids,
and forms this sediment
across the surface
and if you picked it up
and kind of brushed
it in your hand,
it would just look
like a red sand.
It looks totally navigable.
I mean,
that Rover looks like it
could go almost anywhere.
It looks like Arizona in a way.
Looks like a place
the water went away.
Yeah, some places you go,
it's just sand for as
far as the eye can see,
and then other places
there's just giant,
rocky boulders everywhere.
Do you see that thing move?
A dark shadow behind that hill?
Uh, Sasquatch that
would be my guess,
Sasquatch probably.
He's everywhere.
Wouldn't it be funny if
somethin' popped out, there?
Jesus, look at that!
It's a Hominid!
So, Chris,
uh, Mars Rover, huh?
It's amazing!
Chris Hadfield,
great Canadian
astronaut, teacher,
scientist, thinker, writer...
Fellow Spaceship Commander.
And a Spaceship Commander.
Station, this is Houston,
are you ready for the event?
I'm ready for the event.
Mr. Shatner, this is
Mission Control, Houston.
Last time we talked,
you were 250 miles straight
up above Los Angeles
and we had a ten minute
window of communication.
In preparation for
you to call me,
I was thinking,
how do you-how
do you welcome.
Captain Kirk on board
your spaceship?
Open arms.
Yeah, open arms,
but-but, you know,
there's the military
tradition so I thought,
you know, when someone
comes on the ship,
you blow the bosun's pipe.
It's that standard
hailing bosun's whistle,
and I managed to
get a copy of it,
and I got it set up so
that as you and I started
I'd like push play and
hold the microphone
so you could hear
this silly noise.
So picture me scrambling
around on the ship
tryin'-tryin' to properly
welcome you aboard,
but it was delightful to have
you on board my spaceship,
the-the International Space
Station for a while.
It was a delight to talk to you.
We're here at JPL,
and the head of JPL says,
"Hey, Chris, you're the best."
You're gonna go and you
are gonna uncover
"bacteria and water on Mars."
Would you go?
Would you go?
No.
Oh, I'd go.
What will I do with my horses?
Someone else could...
Who will ride them?
Could lead them and
feed them for a while.
So you'd go?
The willingness to
take a personal risk
in order to-to
uncover uh an idea,
to turn over a rock,
to push back the edges
of some black cloak,
that, to me, is the really
interesting part of it.
Got it, but what about
your little granddaughter
waving her bum in the air
when you play the guitar?
You won't see that
for two years.
Uh, I agree.
There is always a trade off
of what you're dreaming of doing
and what you'd like
to do right now,
and as my wife pointed
out to me a long time ago,
giving up on your dreams does
not come for free either.
The-the first people
that we either send to
go start permanently
living on the moon,
which I think will happen
within our lifetimes.
And then eventually,
figure it out that we can
send people as far as Mars.
We need people
who have everything
going for them
that you possibly can.
In our lifetimes,
all space flight has occurred.
You know, no human being
had-had flown in space,
when I was born,
when you were born.
All that has happened
in less than a lifetime,
and yet,
we've permanently left Earth
in that short period of time.
There's six people up on
a space station right now.
They've been up there
for over 15 years,
coming in on 16 years,
rotating crews.
We've been in this really
small place for so long,
and suddenly,
we have developed the capability
to start to see everything else.
What's it like to
float in space?
What's happening to your stomach
and you tongue and your eyes?
We are-we are all living
under the ultimate oppressor,
which is gravity.
It actually physically,
we accept it like,
because we have nothing
to compare it to,
but physically,
it is like this actual,
physical weight
trying to drive you
under its heel into the dirt.
The-the instant that
the engines shut off
and you can float from
your seat, you all...
Everybody laughs.
Is this what you did, you
float, is that what you do?
Yeah, you burst out
laughing 'cause...
No kidding!
If it happened
right now you would
just start laughing.
You'd love it.
You-you can
tumble and fly,
it is instantaneous magic.
It's just magic!
Your music and your pictures,
which are so well known,
tell me what that does
for you and brings to us.
Sometimes you go to the
window of a spaceship
and you say,
"I'm not gonna take a picture.
I just wanna look at the world,"
and you're seeing something,
but it's goin' by at
five miles a second.
You can't keep up,
you can't cognitively
or emotionally keep up
with the huge variety
of geology and history,
and human culture and
I found every time my hand
would grab one of the
cameras and go in,
'cause I wanted to be
able to see it later.
I didn't wanna miss it,
'cause I couldn't soak
it up fast enough
and so I would take
pictures and then,
now, three years later,
I can flick through them and go,
- wow, look what I saw...
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Look what it was underneath me.
Just like exploration
on a spaceship,
music is an amazing
human adventure,
and something that
needs to be shared.
It shouldn't be
kept to yourself.
And so, music, to me,
is almost a way to explain
your life to yourself.
'Till next time.
As this fictional captain
I piloted a spaceship.
But in reality, if you had
that, uh, kind of spaceship,
at warp speed, you
could go anywhere,
within your lifetime you could
go anywhere in the universe...
I think, as a central precept,
I would be looking for life,
but think of what you
discover along the way.
Think of all the other
questions you'd answer.
Think of how you
would wanna have
Stephen Hawking on your crew...
So it's a voyage of discovery.
Just as-as the ultimate
voyage of discovery.
That'd be interesting.
When you stand in
eastern Canada,
and the sun sets and
and the blackness of uh,
of the night envelops you,
and you're looking
up into the skies,
what are you thinking,
what are you seeing?
What's really special
for me, Bill, is
there are little moving
points of light up there,
especially in Canada where
the sun can take a long time
to set because of the
northern latitude,
and those little satellites,
those little specks
of human creativity,
go silently like little
human stars across the sky.
And if it's-if it's a
lucky night for me,
uh, I get to watch the
Space Station go over.
Imagine if you
actually were Kirk
and you'd lived out
that whole career,
and you had settled back to
the place you loved the most,
and you walked out on
a dock and looked up
and watched some young
captain flying your ship,
you could see the
point of light,
and you know that point of light
so exquisitely and completely.
You know every valve in
it and you understood it
and you studied it,
and you know what life
on that ship is like,
you know what it feels like,
smells like,
what it sounds like,
what the camaraderie's like.
It was almost an
extension of yourself,
but now you're just this
person standing on a dock,
trying to connect that
little point of light
with everything, uh,
that you are.
Just one moment Katie
and I will answer
that question for ya.
I stand on the axis
where dreams intersect reality.
I've always wondered
what it takes
to understand the
nature of the universe,
to know it confidently
like the crew
on board
The Starship Enterprise.
If we can literally
look up into the sky
and see the past,
see within 400,000
years of The Big Bang,
I'm comforted that time
might not be the
aggressor we perceive.
I see a shooting star,
and in some ways,
I'm not yet born.
For as long as Star Trek
has been around
the esteemed environmentalist
and broadcaster,
David Suzuki,
whose years on Earth
almost match my own,
has been focusing his message
on preserving and
protecting our planet.
His wisdom is shared by North
America's First Nations,
whose intricate totem
poles rise up to the sky
as symbols of myths and legends,
reflecting their kinship
with Mother Earth.
Hello, brother!
- Hello, brother.
- How ya doing?
Look at how firm
and strong you are!
You're pretty firm yourself!
Well, I ride horses,
what do you do?
Jesus, you should feel his arms!
I walk around like this
for people to feel my arms.
I'm older than you.
I bet that's the first person
who's said that to you.
You're a little bit older.
When I'd enter a room,
I used to go,
"Wow, I'm the youngest here,
now I'm the oldest,
I can't figure it out."
A lot of people
when they get older,
they take themselves
very, very seriously,
and I love the fact that
you send yourself up
in-in commercials
and things.
What would happen if I was
really being truthful?
And you thought I was
sending myself up?
No, I mean, you know,
you know, uh, on a deeper level,
it's over so briefly,
I mean, how can you
take it seriously?
Yeah!
The cosmic joke is, we
think it's important,
but we're just a
continuation, aren't we?
Exactly.
Why don't we talk about that?
I mean, the water
is right there.
The ocean is right
by your doorstep.
Will it be in your
doorstep at some point?
Well, that's the big question.
Fortunately, we're
high up enough here
where even with a sea level
rise of, say, a meter,
it still won't be here,
but the storms will come
into our yard for sure.
All right, so, now
people as old as us say,
well, you know,
the water isn't up yet,
well we're good,
but then you look
at your children,
what do the children do?
And what do the children do?
They've gotta
tell their parents,
who have all the power
and the money now,
if you really love me,
you bloody well
have to get us onto
a different path.
We know that climate change
and the change in the
world is happening
at an accelerating
pace far faster
than you thought 40 years ago.
I learned about climate
change in the '70s
and then I-I
wrote an article.
I said, this is a
slow-motion catastrophe.
It was only in the
late '80s I said,
"Oh, my God,
we gotta act now!"
This is the time in
geological history
when humans are the major force
shaping the physical, chemical,
and biological properties
of the planet.
We are
the force that is determining
where the planet
itself is going.
When they sent astronauts
into outer space,
one of the things they did,
is they went and took
a picture of Earth
and that picture of
Earth from space
gave us a view of our home,
like we never had before.
It was-was one
single system,
the air, the water, the land,
they were all just a part of
that beautiful marble of blue.
Humans invented the
idea of a future,
and because of that,
we are the only
creature that realized
we can affect the future
by what we do today.
But look at what a
lot of people say,
"Well, we've ruined this planet,
we've gotta find
somewhere else."
- Let's talk about that. Okay.
- "Let's go to Mars."
Let's go to Mars".
- Let's ruin Mars.
- The nuttiest...
The nuttiest idea.
We're gonna go to
Mars and terraform it.
We're gonna make it
into like Earth.
It's crazy!
Fuck up your own planet and
then say we're so smart,
we're gonna go and
colonize somewhere else.
I mean, what the hell?
Let's take care
of our home first.
There goes science fiction.
Our lives are very, very brief,
but you and I have something
no other group in society has.
We've lived an entire life.
You've lived life enough
for five or six people.
We've had a lot of experiences!
Those experiences are lessons!
We've learned a lot
through that life.
- No we haven't.
- Yes we have, and if you...
- Yeah, but I don't know anything!
- Come on.
I'm this old guy and I have
no idea what I'm doing.
That is a lesson
well worth knowing!
That's the lesson.
Nobody knows anything.
I don't know shit!
But we're both
looking at the end.
What do you see happening?
Well, one thing I've
learned is that
we're not separate
from our environment.
It's embedded in us.
When we die, we don't
suddenly disappear.
Our atoms, they're
all still there,
they just take a different form,
and when you put
them out like that,
they're recycled,
but that's our immortality.
Perfect.
So it is a great city, isn't it?
Ah, God, yeah.
What a humbling
experience I've had,
trying to get to know
some of the exquisite
mysteries of our universe
and the people who
devote their lives
to its understanding.
It's been said that magic
is the knowledge of angels.
In fact, the great
thinkers of ancient times
were considered not scientists,
but sorcerers,
and so,
my journey has taken me
to Cambridge, England,
one of the pillars of
knowledge in the modern world,
and the home
of Professor Stephen Hawking.
Founded in 1209,
Cambridge University
is where Sir Isaac Newton
established the principals
of modern physics,
where Charles Darwin
proposed the theory
of evolution,
where the atom was split
for the first time.
Great minds of the past,
800 years of knowledge.
Xu Zhimo,
a Chinese poet,
came to Cambridge.
Round 1928, he wrote a poem.
He wrote a poem that
became famous in China.
China sent over a large stone
to commemorate the poem,
placed it under the willow tree
to which he wrote this poem,
and since then,
thousands have come to Cambridge
to pay respect to the
poet and the poem.
"The golden willows
by the riverside."
Are young brides
in the setting sun.
Their glittering reflections.
On the shimmering river.
Keep undulating in my heart.
That pool in the
shade of elm trees.
Holds not clear spring
water, but a rainbow.
Crumpled in the
midst of duckweeds,
Where rainbow-like
dreams settle.
Yet now I cannot sing out loud,
Peace is my farewell music.
Quietly I am leaving,
Just as quietly as I came.
Gently waving my sleeve,
I am not taking away
a single cloud...
King's College Chapel,
more than a century to build,
its construction overseen
by a succession of kings,
kings I know through the
words of William Shakespeare
as an actor on stage
in some of those plays.
Time traveling,
this place echoes with
the passage of time.
Imagine what has
been accomplished
over those centuries
and where will we be in
the era of Star Trek?
That's just 250 years from now.
How will future generations
judge us when they look back
on our time in 800 years?
I've come to the chapel
to collect my thoughts
before meeting one of the
great minds of our time,
Professor Stephen Hawking.
Meeting Professor Hawking
is a rare privilege.
Being invited into his home,
what an honor.
What do I ask a
man of such genius?
Without technology his
dreams would be trapped,
so I've had to prepare my
questions long in advance
so he could spend time
composing his answers.
If this is at all
purposed in some way,
what is that?
So many people
can't do math at all,
and he's just doin'
it in his head.
What is your best
guess as to the actual
physical nature of the universe?
The only thing you got,
is what you've done!
We gain immortality.
This is all an illusion.
We have an unprecedented
moment in time
to move beyond the earth.
To colonize somewhere
else it is crazy!
So the probability
that there are
intelligent life
forms in the universe
other than us is near a 100%.
Dr. Hawking.
How are you?
I'm so delighted to be here.
Uh, I've been
waiting a long time,
not only here
but for a long part of
my life to meet you.
I've been waiting so
long I feel like it's
a lost lover and
you've come, finally,
and we're meeting once again.
How nice to see you.
Thank you so much
for taking the time
and letting us come
into your house.
Greetings, Captain Kirk.
I have not met you before,
but I appeared on The Enterprise
as a hologram in a poker game
arranged by Commander Data.
But then I said,
"In that frame of reference,"
the perihelion of mercury
"would have recessed in
the opposite direction."
That is a great story!
Quite amusing,
Dr. Hawking.
You see, Sir Isaac,
the joke depends on
an understanding
of the relativistic
curvature of spacetime.
Do not patronize me, sir.
I invented physics.
The day that apple
fell on my head
was the most momentous day
in the history of science.
Not the apple story again.
I won 141 Federation credits,
but I don't know
the exchange rate.
Oh, it's tremendous,
but now that uh,
that you've left
the European Union,
it's a lot less.
I made you laugh.
I probably
have succeeded beyond
my wildest dreams.
I've made you smile.
I've traveled a great distance
through time and space
to come here to see you today.
It's a great honor to meet you
in person and I...
I hope to find answers
to the deepest questions
of the universe.
My question, therefore, is.
Star Trek explored many of
the mysteries of the universe,
time travel, warp speed,
teleportation, alien
civilizations,
black holes, parallel universes.
What role do you
think Star Trek plays
in inspiring humanity?
Many of the things
Star Trek foresaw
have come to pass,
or will in the not
too distant future.
We have discovered
many black holes
and space travel is
now commonplace.
We can travel forward in time
by moving at almost
the speed of light.
But I have shown that
it is not possible
to warp spacetime so much
that one can travel
into the past.
Hmm!
Yuri Milner and I
have announced plans
to use radio telescopes
to listen to signals
from alien civilizations.
We plan to send
miniature nanocraft
pushed by a giant laser at
20% of the speed of light
to Alpha Centauri and
search for alien life.
What were your favorite
aliens, and why?
For you to ask me
that is really funny,
when I imagine you
thinking of life
on other worlds
uh, and what they
must look like.
So, first of all
there was The Horta.
Who we thought was a
terrible thing, uh being,
and it turned out it was a
mother protecting its young.
The best Star Treks
had the best aliens,
and they were the best aliens
because they had a purpose
and a reason, and a being,
those were my favorite aliens,
the-the intelligent ones.
Why do we wanna believe
that we're not alone?
It seems that life arose
spontaneously on Earth.
We also believe that the
universe is infinite.
The discovery of even
primitive alien life
would have a profound effect
on our view of the universe
and our place in it.
When I was Captain of
the Starship Enterprise,
we came across alien life forms,
some of them good, some bad.
What should we expect when we
discover intelligent beings?
Intelligent aliens
are likely to be
much more advanced
because they have had galactic
time skills to evolve.
Whereas our civilization is
less than 10,000 years old.
If the alien life
is intelligent,
it is likely to be
much more advanced.
We could learn a lot,
that is,
unless civilizations
become unstable
when they reach a certain
level of technology
and destroy themselves.
This is a depressing thought,
but it could explain
why we haven't received
any signals from aliens.
Looking back I've
come to conclusion that.
Star Trek and other
science fiction
are part of our mythology,
our way of seeking
to explain the things
we don't understand.
Tell me if and-and how.
Star Trek has inspired
and influenced you?
Star Trek inspired me
to want to go into space.
Wow!
I took a flight on the
Vomit Comet in 2007
to experience zero gravity.
This is the training
astronauts have.
Since then,
I have been waiting
for Virgin Galactic.
Me too.
I will be one of
the first passengers
if my doctors allow me to go.
Well, we might be
passengers together.
Maybe I'll sit beside you
as we go into space together.
The focus of your
research right now
is on black holes.
Do your dreams lead to research,
or does your curiosity
lead to your dreams?
My research is
inspired by curiosity,
curiosity about the universe
and the laws that govern it.
If one understands the laws,
one controls the
universe, in a sense.
My ultimate aim would be to find
a complete unified theory
that combines general relativity
with the other laws of physics.
That may be string theory,
but this is not yet clear.
The advances in-in
medicine and technology
since you were diagnosed
with Motor Neuron Disease,
have enabled you
to have a career
that would have
been unimaginable
even ten years earlier.
What do you think your
life would be like
in the 23rd Century?
I hope it would be much better.
It seems my condition
may be caused by a defect
in the repair mechanism
for nerve damage.
We have identified
that gene responsible
and hopefully by
the 23rd Century,
we shall be able to correct it.
Well, I'm a lot older than you,
and uh, the end is near,
and I've been born
too early as well.
I'd love to be able
to extend my life.
We've always dreamed
of immortality,
and we're afraid of dying
and losing all of this.
Do you think science at
some point in the future
will help us
achieve immortality?
Nothing is immortal.
The human repair
mechanisms wear out
like everything else.
To extend life
further would require
a major redesign of
the human genome,
which is unlikely to happen
by the time of Star Trek.
Thank you so much
for taking the time.
Um, it was very generous of you,
and I personally
have fulfilled a,
a longing to meet
you and to see you
and this, um, this, uh, show,
this, uh, program,
has become basically
my journey to see you.
What a privilege
and how grateful I am
for you to have let us into
a small part of your life.
That is a wrap!
Sure, you're in a
movie part once,
and now you're an actor, sure!
How wonderful!
How wonderful!
God, I wish I could have
an evening with you
and-and, uh, talk
about those things.
I had the best time.
I felt like I was
beside a holy man.
I would love to stay for dinner.
What a remembrance I'll have
for the rest of my life.
Wow!
Holy cats!
In this little cottage
by the Cam River,
came into contact with
somebody who is gigantic.
Wow!
Okay, I wonder
what's for dinner?
He invited me for dinner.
He invited me for dinner!
University,
universe,
two words united in meaning,
symbolizing a
universe that connects
each and every one of us.
The River Cam runs through
the heart of Cambridge,
past the colleges
where the seeds of
great ideas are sown.
Darwin once lived here.
Newton's tree is just
around the corner.
As I sit back
and take in the history,
I can reflect on
what I've learned.
Even to the people
smarter than me,
the future will always
be mysterious.
There will always be
questions unanswered.
And I'm reminded of
Shakespeare's words.
"All the world's a stage,"
and all the men and
women merely players.
They have their exits
and their entrances,
and one man in his
time plays many parts.
His acts being seven ages.
Last scene of all,
that ends this strange
eventful history,
is second childishness
"and mere oblivion."
As Captain Kirk,
I was born in 2223,
200 years from now.
While I would love
to see that time,
and was born too soon,
I'm grateful for the small role
I have played in this discourse,
as captain of a starship
in the 23rd Century,
offering up a hopeful
vision of the future.
I have taken a journey
down the river of knowledge,
and I realize
that the truth is
not in the stars,
but in the minds of the
people who imagine a future
of infinite possibility.