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Planets Don't Exist

2022-10-07 · collab / interview · Hank, John · 13:59 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Science & nature (also: US politics & society, History & curiosities) · mode: Explainer · tags: calendar ritual, guest or collab, on location, self promotion, community lore

On the last day of Pizzamas 2022, Hank and John film in an Indiana treehouse, where Hank argues that planets do not exist as a true category (nor do pizza or fish): language is less rich than reality, which matters more than whether Pluto is a planet.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Treehouse setup on the last day of Pizzamas; their childhood fort; a day at an art gallery and the IMA fashion show

  • ★ One brother recalls an elementary-school science fair project counting passing drivers wearing seatbelts, joking he was already a fan of government regulation. (playful) — 00:00:30
  • ★★ John says that earlier in the day he and Hank saw art at a gallery and a fashion show at the IMA, and now they are in a treehouse. — 00:01:00 · Hank Green

00:01:58 — Planets don't exist: what we don't know, the Stephen Sprouse exhibit aside, the planet definition, Mercury, Jupiter and its moons

  • ★★ Hank says the Nobel Prize in Physics was in part about how we don't know what light, or even reality, is. — 00:01:58
  • ★ Hank says we don't know why there is matter, what light is, what is real or whether time is real, and the universe may be two-dimensional. (hedged) — 00:02:27
  • ★★ At the Stephen Sprouse exhibit, Hank told Katherine that someday there would be a museum show like it of Pizza John art; the brothers muse about a Pizza John gallery. (playful) — 00:03:13 · Katherine Green, Pizza John
  • ★★★ Hank says planets are real in the way anything is, but the idea of a planet is not a true category. — 00:03:42
  • ★★ John argues very few categories are true categories, because the relationship between reality and language is not one-to-one. — 00:03:42
  • ★★ Hank says some categories are true, such as protons and electrons, and he thinks life is one, though people will argue with him. — 00:04:11
  • ★★★ Hank is not upset that the redefinition of planets excluded Pluto, because he doesn't think planets exist, and he says most people would agree. — 00:04:11
  • ★★ Hank explains the current definition: a planet must have pulled itself into a sphere (hydrostatic equilibrium), as Pluto, Ceres and many moons have, and must have cleared its orbit. — 00:04:40
  • ★★ Hank says orbit-clearing is a line drawn to make 'planet' feel like a thing; it works in our solar system but will be fuzzy in others. — 00:05:09
  • ★★ Hank doubts Mercury has more in common with Jupiter than with Europa; the gas giant versus terrestrial planet distinction is a bigger deal. — 00:05:09
  • ★★ Hank notes Jupiter has four very large moons, one larger than Mercury, so size is not what makes a planet. — 00:05:39
  • ★★ Hank says that if Jupiter were ten times bigger it would be a star; size is the only difference. — 00:05:39
  • ★★ Hank says that in a world where Jupiter were a star its moons would be planets, though nothing about them changed. (hypothetical) — 00:06:08
  • ★★ John reflects that he exists only because of the sun's light, yet it is the one thing in our natural lives we cannot look at. — 00:06:08

00:06:52 — The sun as the light we cannot look at, ejected planets and making our own light

  • ★★ Hank says a planet ejected from its solar system with no star is still a planet to everyone, gas giant or terrestrial. — 00:07:21
  • ★★ John recalls a favourite memory: discussing ejected planets, Hank said there would be no light and so no life, then paused and added 'unless they made their own light'. — 00:07:47 · Hank Green
  • ★★ John says making our own light, as fireflies and anglerfish do, is one of the coolest things because the idea is so beautiful. — 00:08:14
  • ★★ Hank adds that humans can make something brighter than the sun, which had never happened on Earth before us. — 00:08:14 · Earth

00:08:43 — 'We did it, Joe', parents knowing vice presidents, Dan Quayle and Crown Hill

  • ★★ John jokes that Dan Quayle, an Indiana boy now living in Arizona, could be a future Crown Hill Cemetery resident, and he thought of writing to suggest it. (playful) — 00:09:12 · Indiana

00:09:41 — Pizza, soup and fish don't exist either: categories versus reality and language

  • ★★★ Hank says pizza does not exist either, like the debates over whether a hot dog is a sandwich, the ocean is soup or a calzone is pizza. — 00:09:41
  • ★★ John: One brother says almost everything we think of as dichotomous is in fact spectral. — 00:10:10

  • ★★★ John says the point of saying categories are not real is to remind people that how we describe things differs from how they are: language is less rich than reality. — 00:10:42

    “language is inherently less rich than reality”

  • ★★★ Hank says we still need words like fish; recognizing the limits of categories while valuing them is more interesting than whether Pluto is a planet. — 00:11:04

  • ★★ Hank quizzes John on elements named after planets: mercury, uranium, neptunium and plutonium, which sit in a line, plus one more. — 00:11:04

00:11:21 — Elements named after planets quiz and the closing Pizzamas call to action

  • ★ Hank withholds the last planet-named element and asks viewers to name it in the comments. — 00:11:51
  • ★★ Hank closes with a call to action: it is the last day of Pizzamas at pizzamas.com; pizza doesn't exist, but Pizzamas does. — 00:11:51 · Pizzamas
  • ★★ Hank reveals the educational framing was a trick to get a long, chatty last-day Pizzamas video, which the description calls a loophole in their YouTube rules. (playful) — 00:11:51 · Pizzamas, Four-minute rule

00:12:35 — Sign-off, the T. S. Eliot line, John's phone falls out of the treehouse

In the description and comments

  • ★★ In channel comments Hank confirms the answer is tellurium, from Tellus, Latin for Earth, and finds it weird that Earth has little tellurium. — creator comment · Earth
  • ★★ The description says Pizzamas stuff is available only through this weekend and then never again; a John comment adds that everything disappears on Sunday. — video description · Pizzamas

Humor (significant)

  • Hank climbs out of frame toward the blinding sun while John narrates. — 00:01:29

    “Sorry about the wind noise it's just Hank's getting raptured.”

  • Moving around the treehouse to escape the sun, the brothers note this would be the worst way to go, especially both at once. — 00:07:21

    “Well, I mean, that way at least we don't have to decide what to do when the other one dies.”

  • After John says 'we did it' about humans making light, he adds 'Joe', and Hank calls out the habit. — 00:08:43

    “then I have to pause for three seconds and say Joe.”

  • Discussing vice presidents fading from public memory, they turn to Dan Quayle. — 00:09:12

    “No, it's nothing personal, Dan. I know you're a fan of the vlog, but, yeah, he's barely hanging on.”

  • John has long hoped Dan Quayle will be buried at Crown Hill Cemetery. — 00:09:41

    “I thought about writing him a letter saying I know you live in Arizona now, Dan, but have you considered?”

  • As Hank explains elements named after planets, John notes the fact already appeared online. — 00:11:51

    “One thing about Hank is that even if you've seen the TikTok, you still have to let him finish.”

  • Having argued that pizza doesn't exist, Hank delivers the Pizzamas plug. — 00:11:51

    “Pizza doesn't exist, but Pizzamas does.”

  • One brother garbles a T. S. Eliot line about light, and the other teases him. — 00:12:35

    “I don't want to hurt your feelings, but you're no T.S. Eliot.”

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: categorization · planet

Also: People: Dan Quayle · Joe Biden · Kanye West · Katherine Green · Spiro Agnew · Stephen Sprouse · T. S. Eliot

Projects: Pizzamas

Works: Trivial Pursuit

Organizations: Indianapolis Museum of Art · Instagram · Nobel Prize · TikTok

Terms: Pizza John

Concepts: anglerfish · bioluminescence · firefly (concept) · life · pizza · plutonium · regulation · rogue planet · star

Places: Arizona · Ceres · Crown Hill Cemetery · Earth · Europa · Indiana · Jupiter · Mercury · Pluto · Solar System · Sun (star) · Uranus

Only in the description or credits: Four-minute rule

Also centred on categorization: My Physicalmental Illness · My 'Injury'

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