

Neil deGrasse Tyson Doing an IAmA on Reddit - razerbeans
http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/qccer/i_am_neil_degrasse_tyson_ask_me_anything/

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bherms
"The problem, often not discovered until late in life, is that when you look
for things in life like love, meaning, motivation, it implies they are sitting
behind a tree or under a rock. The most successful people in life recognize,
that in life they create their own love, they manufacture their own meaning,
they generate their own motivation.

For me, I am driven by two main philosophies, know more today about the world
than I knew yesterday. And lessen the suffering of others. You'd be surprised
how far that gets you." -- NdGT

Probably the best thing I've heard in a while. I love when he does these
AMA's.

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redthrowaway
50 minutes old and 4300 comments... best of luck to anyone hoping to ask him a
question.

~~~
mixmax
I just spent 20 minutes writing up a question that was important to me (would
you become a public supporter of Copenhagen Suborbitals, working towards
sending a man into space) only to see it being lost in a sea of questions.

[http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/qccer/i_am_neil_degras...](http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/qccer/i_am_neil_degrasse_tyson_ask_me_anything/c3wgzpl)

~~~
redthrowaway
I gave you a hopeful upvote. I'm generally not a fan of asking AMA subjects
for money, but it sounds like a cool program and something that Dr. Tyson
could be interested in.

~~~
mixmax
We actually just talked about trying to get some international coverage on a
board meeting the other day, so this AMA seemed a pretty good opportunity. Our
goal for this year is to get more international members, it's currenlty mostly
Danes.

Normally I'd agree with you on the money subject, but this just seemed too
good of an opportunity to not act upon. Besides all the money will be spent
building rockets :-)

And thanks a lot for the upvote.

~~~
MortenK
You should try to contact him directly. Just posting a comment on a Reddit
AMA, especially one as popular as this, probably won't make anything happen.

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dhughes
I think to myself "I'm spending too much time on Reddit looking at stupid
stuff" so I come to HN for some highbrow articles and see a link to Reddit of
Neil deGrasse Tyson doing an AMA :/ ...back to Reddit.

~~~
LesZedCB
that's why reddit is in my hosts file...

~~~
panacea
Here is a true story. I've curated the hell out of my reddit frontpage.

I went to reddit just now and while it was loading I thought "I'm so sick of
the downward trend in my enjoyment of the unstoppable march towards extreme
mediocrity in every corner of reddit... if I don't see anything on my
frontpage that interests me this time, I'm going to add it to my hosts file"

I scanned the page, saw nothing that interested me (including this AMA... I
don't even know who he is) and added reddit to my hosts file.

Then I opened Hacker News. Top link? This reddit AMA. Sigh.

~~~
drivebyacct2
I'm tiring of saying it repeatedly, but simply unsubscribe from those
subreddits and visit less often. It's amazing, I know, but reddit is actually
more enjoyable when you don't feel a compulsion to click it every hour. That,
and quite frankly, you're missing out. deGrasse is extremely well spoken about
science and progressing as a human race. Frankly, I'm not surprised it was
posted here, the things he said on The Daily Show a few days ago really made
my hacker insides glow with joy and pride.

I can't believe that "I have so little self control and lack of understand of
how reddit works that I have to forcibly block myself from it via /etc/hosts"
is applauded here. That or it's just tongue-in-cheek "reddit sucks [now]" that
is applauded. Either way, it doesn't matter. Seeing it in every thread that
mentions reddit just perpetuates the stereotype that HN has a bit of an
elitist complex.

~~~
panacea
You mischaracterise me. I've been using reddit for 6+ years. I've pruned my
subscribed subreddits down to a handful of ones with a high signal to noise.

If I pruned AMA, I'd be left with not much. truereddit, theoryofreddit,
askscience and few niche interests (which disproportionately overwhelm my
feed... I'd like a granularity slider for each subscribed subreddit "show me
all <\---> show me only top posts").

Yes. I have 'so little self control' after using reddit for so many years.
It's hard to ween yourself off a habit that was initially so rewarding but has
gradually and ultimately become an unrewarding and depressing time-sink.

You would begrudge me trying to manage my 'addiction' by blocking reddit in my
hosts file? I should man-up and not click when hovering over a reddit
bookmark? I should not tap out cmd-t r enter to navigate there after deleting
the bookmark?

"lack of understand of how reddit works" = false

"That or it's just tongue-in-cheek "reddit sucks [now]" that is applauded."

Do you deny the level of discourse, the level of signal to noise, the benefits
from contributing or participating _haven't_ been dropping over time?

"Seeing it in every thread that mentions reddit"

This was my first comment about reddit on HN. And I can't remember seeing any
others, so I can't comment.

"just perpetuates the stereotype that HN has a bit of an elitist complex."

Where is this stereotype being expressed? "Elitist" is a loaded term. Like
those 'Rucola Eatin' Obama Liberals' that Sarah Palin liked to denigrate? HN
is comprised of people who want to discuss content over fluff and humour. It's
by design! Check out r/askscience. Is that elitist?

You may still get benefits from reading reddit, but after six great years,
it's time for me to ween myself off and go cold turkey.

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prakashk
For those who are just interested in the questions that Dr. Tyson chose to
answer (along with the answers, of course):
<http://www.reddit.com/r/tabled/comments/qcyqa/>

