On a recent episode of Club Shay Shay, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson revisited his now-viral exchange with actor Terrence Howard, walking through how what began as a casual invitation spiraled into a public back-and-forth.
Tyson explained that the initial connection actually came through his mother. “My mother heard Terrence Howard on NPR,” Tyson recalled. “He had some new series coming out. And they talked about his early childhood and he said he loved astronomy and telescopes and the night sky and my mother heard this and said you should get him on your podcast.”
That suggestion led to an in-person meeting at a Fox upfront event, where Tyson was promoting Cosmos.
Recounting the interaction, he said, “I see Terrence Howard. I said pleased to meet you. My mother described this to you. I said I’d love to have you on my podcast. And he said, ‘Great. I’ll send you my writeup.’” Tyson added his immediate reaction: “I was like, huh? What? Huh?”
What arrived afterward, Tyson said, was far from what he expected. “He sends me this 30-page document titled ‘1 times 1 equals 2,’ where he says all of math is wrong. He has a new math that we should use,” he said.
Tyson also reflected on the misunderstanding that followed, explaining, “He thought that I wanted to give him a platform for this new idea that he had, rather than just talk about his geeky underbelly as a science enthusiast. So a little bit is my fault for not knowing that that’s what he was going to send my way.”
Rather than dismiss it, Tyson went through the material in detail. “He said if I felt obligated to reply. I went line by line and I replied. And I kept my version of it, print out,” he said.
The situation later escalated publicly when Howard appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast. Tyson recalled, “He said that I treated him badly, or mean. I was mean to him. And even Joe Rogan said, ‘Are we talking about Neil deGrasse Tyson? Because that’s not my MO. That’s not what I do. I’m not mean to people.’”
Tyson said the growing attention eventually forced a response.
“My producer says, ‘Neil, this is going viral. You have to reply.’ I said, ‘I can’t reply. I don’t want to reply.’ ‘You got to reply.’”
He ultimately agreed and brought his annotated notes into the discussion. “I got my document where all my comments are on it. And I go page by page and I show the audience where I was firm with him, where I was, you know, ‘take this, develop it here, this is not true, and your next page that depends on that is therefore not true,’” he explained.
The response, Tyson noted, took on a life of its own. “It goes viral. And it ends up drawing more views than the original post,” he said, before summing up the episode simply: “I figured, okay, my job is done here. That’s the beginning and end of that episode.”
