Sinai Forum hosts Neil deGrasse Tyson during “Adventures in Science Literacy” 2025 presentation

Purdue University Northwest (PNW) had a packed house at the Blue Chip Casino for the latest edition of the Sinai Forum with a presentation from Neil deGrasse Tyson. The audience, which included attendees from all over Northwest Indiana, gathered in the ballroom at the Blue Chip Casino for the presentation, which was entitled “Adventures in Science Literacy.”

The Sinai Forum was started in 1953 by Sylvia Bankoff, her husband Dr. Milton Bankoff, and Rabbi Karl Richter in Michigan City as a platform for affordable and meaningful town hall-style discussions between prominent individuals and members of the general public. 

Rick Urschel introduced Tyson by sharing stories of how his dad’s lifelong infectious passion for the night sky created core memories. Finding the North Star and the Big Dipper, seeing blurry images of Halley’s comet, and listening to early episodes of Star Talk inspired him from a young age. 

The plan to bring Neil deGrasse Tyson in has been in the works since 2017. 

“We want to acknowledge the largest number of college and high school students to see a speaker in recent memory,” said Leslie Plesac, executive director of the PNW Sinai Forum. “Our speaker emphasises that science literacy helps everyone better understand the world.”

After confirming with the audience that, in fact, they were here to listen to an astrophysicist talk for an hour, he then kicked off a spirited talk. He used real world examples, actual statistics, and a combination of sarcasm and levity to bring to light how easy it is to be misinformed. He spoke about how complex subjects can be understood by asking the experts, trusting science, and how science is different from human senses.

The news business, social media, political winds, and communication driven by fear and clicks all took some well-deserved jabs. They served as examples on how a little bit of scientific questioning could quickly nullify the dramatic headlines about the latest eclipse, flares or spots on the sun, UFOs, or the comet that is soon going to crush Earth.   

Tyson showed inspiring examples of the scope of space, and incredible examples of imagery capturing details we could only have theorized about millions of miles away.  He contrasted those things with a world where we all have high resolution cameras, yet nobody has ever gotten clear footage of an alien here on Earth, which brought laughter from the crowd.

While much of his presentation touched on science,and how there is much to be done developing literacy here in this country, in particular for the building blocks of knowledge, his view of the skies impacts how he wants to live here on good old planet Earth. Simple principles he shared:

 “For me, I create meaning. I want to know more about the world than I did yesterday. That way, I can continue to grow and I don’t become ossified in some state of mind like the day I graduated high school.”

“In whatever little way, lessen the suffering of others every day.”

“If I do someone a favor, don’t pay me back any gesture. Pass it forward. It becomes a river of good deeds that percolates through society.”

He closed by sharing Horace Mann’s words that sum up those principles with the same kind of stark reality that he brings to science literacy.  

“Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity,” said deGrasse Tyson.For more information on future sessions of the Sinai Forum, please visit pnw.edu/sinai-forum.