humanity has faced two monumental
questions since we first stood on two
feet why are we here in are we alone in
the universe well we may actually be
closer to answering the latter a study
out of the UK is fueling theories that
there are 36 intelligent alien races in
just our galaxy alone joining me now to
break it all down theoretical physicist
and author of the future of humanity
Michio Kaku thank you so much first of
all for joining us when I read about
this late last week you're the first
person I thought of
and so maybe we're getting closer to
answering that question is there life
outside of this outside of Earth well
that's the greatest existential question
of all the time are we alone in the
universe let's do a science experiment
go outside tonight look up see the Milky
Way galaxy
you are now staring at 100 billion stars
in our backyard the Milky Way galaxy and
then we make a ballpark estimate how
many of those stars have planets how
many of those planets have oceans how
many of those oceans have fish and
aquatic life how many of them have
intelligent life and so this is called
Drake's equation trying to get a
ballpark estimate of how many
civilizations there are in the galaxy
and that's where they came up with the
number 36 they took a bare-bones
streak down Drake's equation to get that
number it's a fascinating number and
it's encouraging and I guess the
question though is will win or what will
they reveal themselves why haven't they
revealed themselves and and what could
we expect are they going to be more
intelligent than we are well that's
called the Fermi paradox where are they
it turns out that if you have a Milky
Way galaxy with 36 dots on it each side
is separated by 17 thousand light years
so in other words even if we are
populated with 36 extraterrestrial
life-forms the distance is so great that
we're not going to be able to
communicate with them with radio or tell
would take 17,000 years for a TV signal
to go from one planet to the next planet
it's not gonna happen anytime soon sorry
about that okay but there's no sense
that they could have been so involved in
long before us they could be here maybe
maybe they think we're still you know a
few thousand years behind and and maybe
we will get a welcome to see hey you
know we've advanced somewhat as a
civilization but you don't want to - our
hopes that we might one day come in
contact with ET well I think that one
day they may actually land on the White
House lawn and announced their existence
however as Stephen Hawking cautioned us
we have to be careful because remember
when Cortez met Montezuma in Mexico
Cortes had steel yeah he had gunpowder
he had the horse he had the written
language and the Aztecs had none of
those and within just a matter of a few
months the Aztec civilization collapsed
so let's hope that they are peaceful I
think they are but let's hope they are
peaceful when they land on the White
House lawn
michio outside of the potential hostile
aliens the future of humanity what does
it look like now well you know in 2024
we're going back to the moon that's
right the first men and women will go
back to the moon 2024 and then it's on
to Mars
sometime after 2030 and who knows maybe
mining the asteroid belt to help pay for
all of this because we could have a new
gold rush a new gold rush in outer space
by hard to state the platinum-based rare
earth minerals inside the asteroid go
and that could help to pay for the
entire space program so we're seeing a
new friend care costs are dropping
booster rockets are reusable there's a
partnership between public enterprise
and private enterprise so I think we're
witnessing the dawn of a new era in
space exploration well
wonderful to be alive at this time to
see all of that it's great to have you
guide us through with Michio thank you
very much as usual we appreciate it my
pleasure