Neil DeGrasse Tyson has shared a disturbing theory on what happens to us when we die.
While it’s a question many people wonder about, it’s one that will never be answered.
And despite people coming back from near-death experiences sharing stories of dark tunnels and bright lights, none of us will truly know what it’s like to die until it's too late to tell the rest of the human race about it.
American astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson is known for often sharing his own scientific theories with the world.
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And while we might never know if there is an afterlife, Tyson recently shared what happens to our bodies on earth after we pass away.
Talking during an episode of his StarTalk podcast, the scientist explained what happens after a traditional burial, where the body is left to decompose naturally in the ground, saying: “That’s my choice. So that the energy content of my body, which is still there when you die, your molecules were built up from your lifetime of eating and exercising and the building of your organs and your muscles and other tissue.
“In death, those molecules still contain energy. If I’m buried and I decompose, all that energy gets absorbed by microbes, by flora and fauna dining upon my body the way I have dined upon flora and fauna my whole life. In that way, giving back to the Earth.”
According to Tyson, if a person is cremated, those molecules don’t just disappear and are instead transferred into heat.
The clip was published to YouTube, with many people taking to the social media platform’s comment section to share their own reactions to it.
One user wrote: “The most beautiful way of looking at death!”
Another said: “We return to the universe, just not the way most think.”
A third person commented: “The problem with burial is that most of the time you are placed in an almost indestructible coffin, not directly into the earth. Sometimes that coffin is placed in a cement box depending on the state regulations. It would take hundreds of years for you to give your energy back to the earth in that instance.”
And a fourth added: “Thus, this proves that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but only transformed from one form to another.”
Tyson previously shared his thoughts on the idea of the universe being a simulation.
He believes that, while humans aren’t intelligent enough to build a simulation of that scale, it could be the expertise of a smarter civilization.