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StarTalk Radio

The Science of Godzilla, Zombies & Other Monsters, with Charles Liu

with Charles Liu

Published October 21, 2025
View Show Notes

About This Episode

Neil deGrasse Tyson, co-host Matt Kirshen, and astrophysicist Charles Liu explore the science and cultural meaning of monsters, from Godzilla, dragons, King Kong, and Frankenstein to zombies and black holes. They discuss how physics, biology, and scaling laws constrain what monsters could exist, and how stories about monsters reflect human fears, technological change, and environmental anxieties. Throughout, they argue that the real "monsters" are often human hubris and ignorance, and that science can both demystify and reframe these fears.

Topics Covered

Science fiction Horror fiction Mathematics and physics Climate change projections Existential risk Folklore Black holes Halloween Monsters Zombies

Disclaimer: We provide independent summaries of podcasts and are not affiliated with or endorsed in any way by any podcast or creator. All podcast names and content are the property of their respective owners. The views and opinions expressed within the podcasts belong solely to the original hosts and guests and do not reflect the views or positions of Summapod.

Quick Takeaways

  • Monsters in stories often originate from misunderstood natural phenomena and become less frightening as science explains them.
  • Godzilla and other kaiju embody post-war Japanese fears about nuclear weapons and environmental destruction, evolving from city-destroyers into reluctant protectors.
  • Basic physics and scaling laws show that many giant movie monsters could not actually move or even stand under their own weight.
  • Classic monsters like vampires, King Kong, and Frankenstein's creature are allegories about human evil, scientific hubris, and exploitation of nature.
  • Modern zombie narratives and shows like "The Last of Us" reframe monsters as products of climate change, pandemics, and biological evolution, with humans often behaving more monstrously than the infected.
  • Fungal parasites such as cordyceps that control insect behavior are real-world inspirations for zombie stories, though they currently cannot survive inside warm-blooded humans.
  • Stories like "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" and "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" use monsters to expose paranoia, tribalism, and the ease with which humans turn on each other.
  • Carl Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World" and the "dragon in my garage" parable illustrate how unfalsifiable claims about monsters or the supernatural lie outside science.
  • Black holes started as terrifying physics "monsters" but became routine astrophysical objects once their properties were understood.
  • Across cultures and eras, monsters function as mirrors, revealing our deepest fears, values, and blind spots.

Podcast Notes

Show introduction and participants

Framing the episode on monsters

Neil introduces the topic as an episode on the physics of monsters, including biology and chemistry aspects[1:21]
The monster theme is presented as both fun and potentially unsettling[1:21]

Host and co-host introductions

Neil identifies himself as Neil deGrasse Tyson, "your personal astrophysicist"[1:42]
Comedian Matt Kirshen is introduced as co-host and described as a professional comedian[1:53]
• Matt jokes that "professional comedian" is what it says on his tax return
Matt talks briefly about being on tour, opening for UK comedian Sarah Millican and doing his own club headlining sets[2:08]
Neil teases Matt about "pilfering" Sarah Millican's audience by promoting his own shows to them[2:18]
Matt mentions his podcast "Probably Science" and jokes that Neil always intentionally misnames it[2:32]

Introducing guest Charles Liu and his background

Charles Liu's role and affiliation

Neil introduces Charles Liu as the "geek in chief" for topics like monsters[3:01]
Charles confirms he is a professor at CUNY, Staten Island (City University of New York)[3:27]
• He notes CUNY has many campuses and about a quarter million full-time students

Charles Liu's podcast "The Looniverse"

Charles says he hosts a podcast called "The Looniverse" that started a few years ago[3:40]
He explains his family came up with the punny title and he initially felt strange about putting his own name into "the universe"[3:59]
• Neil reassures him that many podcasts use the host's name and praises the cleverness of the "Looniverse" pun
They riff on other puns with Liu's name like "Lunitic," "The Liu," and "lewd behavior"[4:19]

Why humans create monsters and cultural roots

Monsters as responses to the unknown

Charles says humans have always created monsters out of things we didn't understand and feared, to explain them and put them into context[4:30]
• He notes that as a scientist he is still driven by the unknown, the creative, and the strange, similar to how earlier humans mythologized the unknown
He points out that many historical "monsters" later turned out to be natural phenomena once science advanced[5:46]
Neil gives the example of a Triceratops skeleton eroding out of a cliff face possibly inspiring dragon-like myths before dinosaurs and extinction were understood[4:52]

Monsters as non-human beings in mythology

Charles emphasizes that in many traditions, monsters aren't inherently evil; they're simply non-human creatures[5:02]
He connects this idea to ancient Greek myths where non-human creatures like centaurs and minotaurs explore human nature and the unknown[5:02]
• Neil mentions constellations like Draco the dragon and the Minotaur as examples of monstrous figures in the sky that aren't necessarily portrayed as purely scary

Eastern vs Western dragons and cultural views of monsters

Asian vs European dragons

Neil contrasts European dragons, often portrayed as menaces, with Asian dragons, which are playful, noble, and helpful[6:18]
Charles explains that in the Chinese zodiac, the dragon is the only truly mythological creature among otherwise real animals[6:18]
• He recounts a story that the dragon finished sixth in a race because it stopped to help a rabbit cross a river, showing its kindness
• Charles notes that dragons are considered especially successful, smart, and potentially wealthy, and some parents time births (e.g., C-sections) to have children in the Year of the Dragon

Reframing monsters for children

Neil suggests Sesame Street intentionally used the word "monsters" for its Muppets to de-scarify the concept for children[7:56]
• He points out that the monsters on Sesame Street are lovable, playful, and colorful, which changes how kids perceive the word monster
They note that the Count is technically a vampire and thus a kind of monster, but on Sesame Street he is more about counting than scaring[7:40]

Vampires, Dracula, and the undead

Historical roots of Dracula

Charles connects the Dracula myth to Vlad the Impaler and local Eastern European stories used to scare children with the idea he would come get them after death[9:55]
He explains the long-standing folk concept of the undead that predates Bram Stoker's novel[9:28]
• Bram Stoker modernized the myth into Count Dracula, later popularized in film by Bela Lugosi and others, and then updated with characters like Tom Cruise's Lestat

Moral framing of undead monsters

Charles argues that what makes the vampire monstrous is less its non-human status and more the fact that Dracula was a "really bad human" before becoming undead[10:48]
They point out that other representations like Sesame Street's Count strip away the fear while keeping the monster form[10:55]

Godzilla and kaiju as scientific and cultural monsters

Godzilla's origin and symbolism

Neil notes that Godzilla first appeared in 1954, less than a decade after the atomic bombings of Japan, and is depicted as radioactively created[17:28]
Charles confirms this is not a coincidence and that Godzilla channels Japanese fears about atomic testing, nuclear weapons, and environmental degradation[17:52]
• In Godzilla's mythology, atomic testing awakens or transforms a large but benign creature into a destructive force that wipes out cities
• Charles highlights the implicit question "what have we done?" as humans create forces that then devastate their own cities, with humans becoming collateral damage

Other kaiju: Gamera, Mothra, Rodan, King Ghidorah

Charles introduces Gamera, a giant flying turtle similar in scale to Godzilla, and notes it also comes from the Japanese monster tradition[18:55]
Neil recalls Mothra, and says his personal favorite is Rodan, a supersonic pterodactyl-like monster whose wake flips trucks[19:18]
Charles notes that Mothra starts as a silkworm-like caterpillar before becoming a moth, tying the creature to regionally important silkworm culture[20:07]
• He describes movies where Mothra spins silk to trap enemy monsters and where eggs hatch into multiple Mothras, with a scientist remarking that multiple births are common in insects
They mention films where Godzilla, Mothra, and Rodan team up to fight King Ghidorah, a three-headed alien monster representing conquest and evil[20:24]

Physics of Godzilla's atomic breath and monster abilities

Charles says Godzilla's distinctive feature beyond size is its atomic breath, whose physics have been retroactively rationalized in different ways[21:11]
He contrasts atomic breath with ancient dragons' fire-breathing, which predates any human understanding of atomic energy and is rooted in myth[21:54]

Gamera's story and human attempts to control nature

Gamera's behavior and Plan Z

Charles describes Gamera as a monster who eats fire, initially destroying cities because he seeks out flames as nutrition[23:50]
• In one film, Gamera knocks over a structure, catches a falling child, gently puts the child down, and ultimately is willing to leave Earth to save it
Humans devise "Plan Z" to stop Gamera from knocking down cities and consuming oil refineries while also trying not to kill him[24:23]
• They lure Gamera with flaming gasoline cars and rail cars at a depot, then use flares to guide him up a mountain
• A typhoon blows out the flares, a volcano erupts, and Gamera continues up toward the volcano, eventually entering a fiery area that closes around him as the top of a rocket that launches him to Mars

Monsters modeled on real organisms and physics constraints

Charles says many monsters are based on real life forms people care about, such as dinosaurs, insects, and other animals[25:48]
Neil questions the plausibility of huge monsters like Godzilla being both enormous and nimble given physical limits[26:08]

Scaling laws: why giant monsters cannot exist as depicted

Basic scaling of size, mass, and strength

Charles explains that if you double an organism's height, its volume and mass increase by a factor of eight (2×2×2), while cross-sectional area-and thus strength-grow more slowly[3:21]
• If you scale height, width, and thickness by 10, mass goes up by 1000, but bone and muscle strength only by about 100, requiring structures 10 times stronger than known materials
He concludes that a 400-foot-tall Godzilla would be so heavy that all known bone and muscle would fail; it would collapse into a blob unable to move, let alone walk cheerfully[27:23]

Small animals with seemingly superhuman abilities

Matt mentions childhood claims that fleas or crickets scaled to human size could jump over skyscrapers, and notes this is wrong because their legs could not support the weight[27:53]
• He jokes that a human-sized flea would just lie on the floor, unable to move under its own weight
Charles says this misunderstanding comes from people who don't know physics, but that we are still inspired by small creatures' relative abilities when imagining monsters[27:59]

King Kong and Frankenstein: nature, hubris, and the first science-fiction monster

King Kong as a sympathetic monster and environmental allegory

Neil notes King Kong predates Godzilla by about 20 years and depicts a giant ape who is benign on Skull Island until humans capture and exploit him[30:55]
Charles suggests some view King Kong as a message about not harming the environment or nature, which may "bite you in half" if mistreated[30:33]
• He recalls scenes of Kong dangling and biting a human, representing frightening, "unfettered" nature when humans lose control
They recount how Kong is brought to New York as the "eighth wonder of the world," panics under camera flashbulbs, breaks chrome-steel chains, and is ultimately killed by airplanes atop the Empire State Building[31:11]
• Charles highlights the impresario's overconfidence in "chrome steel" chains and reads it as human hubris in underestimating nature and overestimating technology

Frankenstein as early science fiction and warning about violating nature

Charles calls Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" the first true science fiction novel in the European tradition, portraying Dr. Frankenstein creating life unnaturally[35:01]
He says the story allegorizes a man trying to violate nature and "be God" or even "be a woman" by creating life, leading to loss of control and monstrosity[35:08]
Neil notes Frankenstein's creation is assembled from grave-robbed body parts and then animated using electricity, reflecting early 19th-century experiments[35:23]
• Charles references Galvani and Volta attaching electrical leads to frog legs to make them twitch, which suggested a link between electricity and muscular motion
• Neil connects this to modern defibrillators that restart a heart using controlled electric shocks, showing Mary Shelley's intuition was partly correct

Mary Shelley's broader speculative work

Charles mentions Mary Shelley also wrote an apocalyptic pandemic novel about a disease that kills almost everyone, possibly titled "The Last Man"[35:48]
He says she speculated about future airships traveling quickly between cities like London and more distant places, imagining balloon-like craft with flapping wings[36:13]
He notes she did this before Jules Verne's famous speculative works, underscoring her significance in early science fiction[36:34]

The undead and zombie narratives as reflections of death anxiety and modern threats

Why the undead fascinate us

Neil admits he was never as enchanted with the undead as many people, but recognizes zombies have become the monster of the day in modern media[37:07]
Charles argues that the undead fascinate us because we are alive and have no experimental access to what happens after death, making it the ultimate unknown[37:59]
• He notes that even religious beliefs about the afterlife cannot be confirmed through experiment, despite attempts to measure things like the "weight" of a soul

The Walking Dead and rules of zombification

Neil praises "The Walking Dead" for recognizing that long-dead, putrefied bodies cannot be reanimated, so zombification requires relatively recent death[39:19]
He notes that in that universe, everyone is already infected; upon death, people automatically become zombies, raising existential questions about whether staying alive is worthwhile[39:49]
Charles frames this as a question of what makes someone a monster versus human, and whether death always implies monstrosity[40:09]

Fungi, climate change, and "The Last of Us"

Real-world cordyceps fungi and zombie ants

Charles explains that fungi form their own kingdom distinct from plants and animals, and many parasitize cold-blooded animals like ants and wasps[42:27]
He describes the "zombie ant" fungus (a cordyceps species) that infects ants, makes them climb, and then sprouts fruiting bodies from their heads to spread spores[42:14]
• He notes these fungi do not parasitize humans because our warm-blooded internal temperatures are too high for them to thrive

Climate change enabling new fungal threats in fiction

"The Last of Us" imagines that global warming drives fungi to evolve tolerance for higher temperatures, allowing a cordyceps-like fungus to jump to humans[42:44]
Charles emphasizes that the fungus in the story is not evil; it is simply following evolutionary pressures to survive and reproduce[43:08]
He argues the story shows humans as the true monsters: in the face of fungal threat, humans kill, oppress, isolate, and behave cruelly to one another[42:42]
• He ties this to humans having created the climate conditions that allow such a fungus to evolve, making the crisis a boomerang of human-caused environmental change

Monsters as mirrors of human behavior and paranoia

Invasion of the Body Snatchers and uncanny doubles

Neil discusses "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," where alien spores create human duplicates emerging from pods who look normal but are no longer themselves[49:08]
They note such stories are terrifying because the monsters look human yet are subtly "off," making viewers imagine themselves in that predicament[49:18]

Uncanny valley and fear of almost-human figures

Matt connects this to the uncanny valley: if something is very cartoony or perfectly human it's fine, but almost-human robots or animations evoke unease[50:04]
Neil mentions that in "Finding Nemo," human characters were intentionally animated a bit clunky rather than fully realistic to avoid this effect and keep focus on the fish[50:33]
Charles notes that in many monster narratives, once we get used to monsters and understand them, they become less frightening and sometimes even friendly[51:29]

Twilight Zone: "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street"

Neil summarizes the episode where strange events (flickering lights, cars starting) make neighbors suspect each other of being monsters[51:06]
As unexplained events spread from house to house, the residents descend into paranoia and violence against one another[51:23]
The twist ending reveals two aliens observing, concluding that humans inevitably turn on themselves under minimal provocation and will be easy to conquer[52:04]
• Neil uses this to underscore the recurring theme that "we are the monsters" in many stories

Science, skepticism, and non-physical monsters

Carl Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World" and the dragon parable

Neil cites Carl Sagan's book "The Demon-Haunted World" as important for distinguishing scientific from non-scientific monsters[53:51]
Charles recounts Sagan's "dragon in my garage" parable, where every test for the dragon's existence is countered with excuses (invisible, silent, no detectable effects)[54:28]
• He explains this illustrates how unfalsifiable claims lie outside science, regardless of how vividly one insists the monster exists

Attempts to scientifically detect the soul

Neil mentions experiments where dying patients were weighed before and after death to see if a soul had mass, as well as early X-ray experiments looking for something leaving the body[54:38]
He notes that such experiments did not detect a soul, but he gives them credit for attempting to test a popular belief scientifically[55:04]

Belief, imaginary friends, and adult monsters

Neil compares children's imaginary friends to adult beliefs in monsters or supernatural beings that serve similar psychological roles[55:31]
Charles argues that there's nothing inherently wrong with unscientific ideas like ghosts or monsters until they are used negatively to control, harm, or oppress others[56:40]
Matt notes that as a comedian he can make people laugh at themselves and their unscientific but emotionally powerful ideas, such as fears embodied in monsters[55:54]

Physics monsters: black holes and changing perceptions

Black holes from terror to textbook objects

Neil and Charles discuss how black holes were once treated as terrifying cosmic monsters in science fiction and popular imagination[56:39]
Charles notes that as astrophysics matured, black holes became understood as natural astrophysical objects, no longer imbued with supernatural menace[56:39]
Neil quips that black holes are now like Cookie Monster: voracious but safe as long as you keep your distance[56:39]

Modern portrayals of friendly or ambiguous monsters

Friendly monsters in Buffy, Twilight, and games

Charles points out that series like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and the "Twilight" books feature monsters (vampires, demons) who can be allies, love interests, or sympathetic characters[57:02]
He says that as audiences get used to monsters, culture often softens them into complex or even cuddly characters rather than pure villains[57:12]
Charles describes the video game series "Monster Hunter" where monsters coexist with humans as part of the ecosystem, and hunters are more like ecological managers who maintain balance when monsters go out of control[57:34]
• He notes that in these stories, monsters usually go out of control because some non-monster agent (often human) has done something unwise, again placing blame on human actions

Monsters, science fiction, and understanding ourselves

Sci-fi monsters as commentary on the present

Neil argues that good science fiction often uses monsters and futuristic settings to reflect contemporary social, moral, or philosophical issues[58:38]
He sees zombie and pandemic stories as potentially exhausted in terms of novelty but acknowledges they have been rich in exploring lessons about human nature[59:10]

Monster Mash and cultural lightheartedness

Neil cites "Monster Mash" as a great, lighthearted monster-themed song with clever rhyming tied to Halloween culture[57:44]

Closing reflections: monsters as tools for introspection and science communication

Hierarchy of geekiness and Charles's role

Neil jokes that however geeky you think you are, there is always someone geekier, and he places Charles far along that geek "infinity" scale[59:54]
He says he learns something every time Charles appears and that being around Charles boosts his own "geek street cred"[1:00:07]

Neil's final thoughts on monsters and science

Neil expresses admiration for inventive monster design in science fiction and values any story element that reveals insights about ourselves[58:38]
He argues that stories solely about humans miss an important dimension; monsters push characters to behavioral "edges" that reveal deeper truths[59:12]
Neil says that if a creator "earns the sci" in sci-fi by grounding monsters in real biology, chemistry, physics, or materials science, then they can take the story anywhere and it will still engage scientifically literate audiences[59:32]
He concludes that in the end monsters teach us about ourselves, offering a kind of cosmic perspective on human fears and behavior[1:00:19]

Lessons Learned

Actionable insights and wisdom you can apply to your business, career, and personal life.

1

Monsters are most powerful in storytelling when they embody our real fears-about nature, technology, death, or each other-rather than being arbitrary threats.

Reflection Questions:

  • • What current fear or uncertainty in your own life could be turned into a "monster" metaphor to help you examine it more clearly?
  • • How might recognizing the real-world anxieties behind your favorite fictional monsters change the way you interpret those stories?
  • • Where in your work or relationships could you use metaphor (instead of literal argument) to surface and discuss underlying fears?
2

Understanding the underlying science of something that scares us-whether it's a disease, a technology, or a natural phenomenon-tends to demystify it and reduce unproductive fear.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Which topic or threat do you currently find intimidating that you could deliberately research to make it less overwhelming?
  • • How could learning a bit of the "physics" or "biology" behind a worry you have change the decisions you make about it?
  • • What concrete step (a book, a course, a conversation with an expert) can you take this month to replace vague dread with specific understanding?
3

Human hubris-overconfidence in our ability to control nature or technology-is a recurring source of disaster in both fiction and real life.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Where are you currently assuming "this system is under control" without fully understanding its failure modes?
  • • How could you build in simple checks or humility practices to catch overconfidence before it turns into a serious problem?
  • • What is one project or tool in your life where you should revisit your assumptions and stress-test what could go wrong if you're wrong?
4

The line between "monster" and "victim" is often drawn by perspective; many fictional monsters become sympathetic once we see their origins and motives, just as real people do.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Who in your life or workplace have you mentally cast as a "villain" without fully understanding their context or constraints?
  • • How might your interpretation of a conflict change if you rewrote the story briefly from the other party's point of view?
  • • What is one practical step you can take this week to humanize someone you've been demonizing, even if you still disagree with them?
5

Good skepticism requires insisting on testable claims; if a "monster" (or any belief) is defined in a way that evades all possible evidence, it belongs in imagination, not in decision-making.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Which beliefs or rumors are you currently acting on that you've never actually tried to verify?
  • • How could you rephrase a strong belief you hold so that it would, in principle, be falsifiable or testable?
  • • What is one decision you're facing where you should explicitly separate what is evidence-based from what is purely speculative or symbolic?

Episode Summary - Notes by Jordan

The Science of Godzilla, Zombies & Other Monsters, with Charles Liu
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