Mark Lawson talks to Patrick Moore

the life of Sir Patrick more consistently prove people wrong during a sickly childhood in which he suffered from a heart condition and other serious ailments doctors warned that he shouldn't expect a long life but until his death at the age of 89 he continued to present the monthly astronomy series the sky at night thus contradicting another conventional wisdom belief the TV is a medium for beautiful young people although modern media focus groups would probably advise against putting on screen presenters in ill-fitting blazers and monocles of regimental ties the sky at night first screened in 1957 achieved the record of the world's longest-running TV show with the same presenter one thing I can promise you if I'm still alive in 25 years time in 2007 and if I'm still broadcasting I'll still find plenty to say more I never missed one edition when in hospital with food poisoning and even as the effects of age became increasingly apparent in appearance and speech maintained his passion for educating viewers about the mysteries of the universe all the indications are that the Russians are now making such immense progress that almost anything may happen at any moment he introduced successive generations to satellites moon shots and eclipses you know if I'd come on the air in 1957 when we did the first of these sky at night programmes and said that within five years I'd be showing you pictures of the first man to go round the earth in orbit in a spaceship well I think you'd regarded me as mad however the first astronomer to become a TV star also had another screen career sending up his eccentric personality in light entertainment and quiz program if I may trouble you mr. ball maybe though he remains starstruck in another way he always maintained that his greatest achievement was inspiring the astronomers of the future this is a powerful light and this one is simply a small pocket torch but then Kidal you knew that one was further away than the other there was no way which of the till this previously unseen interview was recorded in 2007 at his home in Sussex where he'd lived for much of his life and where in deference to his age and health the sky at night was filmed during his final years seventy-eight years since she were given a book called the story of the solar system do you still look at the sky with excitement I most certainly do because the trouble is of them I no longer very mobile or physically and therefore I can't do what I did with them until this happened yes I was in my observatory on every clear night I very much miss it now so you're not able now to look at the sky and the way you would like and not really because I may observe a fate which is um outside in the grounds and so we're very nice fifteen-inch tend to skip in it but the trouble is I'm not know about now and I can't get into the service Oh other people here that said the I can't us and so what I'm injury of the course up these things happen you'll regarded by a lot of people as an eccentric the the molecule is not a very usual form of I wear the xylophone is not a particularly conventional instrument do you accept that you're an eccentric I pop that into hits and multiple no no ma no problem I can see quite well without it but if I put my molecule in my two I is quite equal otherwise they're not I just put in there sharpen things up design firm well when I was a boy about nine or ten somebody came to see us will them understand xylophone I don't mean a toy a little band thing I tried it this is rather fun so I went on but I say have never had a music lesson in my life but you are you're you're an unusual vivid figure in the way you talk in the way you perform is any of that cultivated no not a bit not unless right system I've never constantly cultivated in the Casals it says me when you watch yourself on television one always sees one's own faults very clearly I mean mine I know I talk far too fast I have to forget things in I will I just perfectly well but it's no good my trying to slow it down I mean this is just me did you always speak fast as a boy I don't know we're live long time ago I didn't think I did particularly um I don't be too fast now Nina you suddenly you slow it down for broadcasting Burton if I'd met you in childhood you would have been recognizably the Patrick Moore we know I don't know because but even the age of six and fifteen I was very much off and I couldn't get around the fleur-de-lis I find this my official schooling for that reason it's no use ins but every guys have the same kind of person but I wasn't very active any actor then I couldn't play any games example but this is the extraordinary thing that I'm talking to you you're at the age of 84 beautiful you were not expected to have a long life at all waivers of your childhood illness well I go slightly cropped heart these D these things happen if I've hopefully that one run though certain things I can't do certain things I can bad man it's anyway but in childhood you were you were effectively treated as an invalid for for ten years well more of this wasn't quite ten years six to fourteen and a half 8050 and I could get around again and got some not long after that I got a very so as many of them you were an only child many people have theories about any children that it encourages their imagination is that the case I know why a man in his child my father remember would elect another but then you quite well they couldn't look after and educate more than once there's never no look I was elected father or sister but um that doesn't happen did you feel lonely in childhood I do they have held own rape I had plenty to do I knew plenty of people they just they couldn't get around to do things other boys did and therefore I had since I'd never done this I didn't miss it given that astronomy has been such a part of your life that moment if they ever make the the life story of Patrick Moore the movie the moment when you're given that book at the age of six the story of the service system will be deeply significant did it feel significant to you I wasn't actually given it I was empty dining on a my old home and it was raining and I was a bit bored I returned a bookcase and my mother was always a bit incisionless on of it not wildly so but enough to have one that he little books about it and I picked up one of this and behind you know the story of the solar system it wasn't the boys as our book was my reading was all right and I coax I said I walked out of that chair let's finish the book this is fun and he was a 19th century books they presumably the view of the solar system was by what we know now fairly primitive and not really obviously we know far more now than he did them but they the essentials were there they haven't altered a lot so the vertical book in 1898 I went as I said when I was when I was six as over thirty years later but it was still good mr. bears and you had a lucky chance there have been many in your life which was to meet a significant local astronomer astronomer I had two great sizes of luck one I was fascinated by astronomy I lived in Worcester lay in the eastern said opposite house was a big estate owned by man in Henley of alien endless he blew a kiss on his hip and in his craft he had a small private Observatory Brockhurst Observatory run by an astronomer named W s facts with well-known Isana about 5 foot 8 had long white beard looked exactly like a new delightful chap level installer and I got to know him and he very kindly took me over there and show me this in pieces how to observe I did that and then when I was 14 thanks heaven he was killed in a mismatch and Henry said to me look you day stuff I want something of it what my observe it a show people often they want this research here there will you do it so be honest so I found myself projected observed at the age of 14 and that went on as well that's before the war when Henry died and the observers that was one slice of life I was rising like was on the british astronomical association a friend of our family major AE Levine was a member she be talking against the world you're very young fit but I'll put you up for membership and we're going to Scientology said shaking hands with the prison this one royal and being welcomed as a member I was 11 exactly 50 years later after the day I wasn't you the president of a time it seems extraordinary for a boy of that age to be coming a member to be running the observatory it was sheer luck give me a small private of the love of it my duty there were to UM keep various records can I get uses him skip whatever I want to it was a six-inch and demonstrate whenever I'm done so I did that nothing to him but did it did it feel an unusual thing to be doing to you yes it did fact that it was unusual but I could cope with him it wasn't really honorable something in this specialized knowledge but sir I enjoyed it thoroughly your autobiography is unusual in that your first 30 years are dealt with in two and a half pages at the beginning of the book as if you regard your childhood as unimportant it wasn't to me will be an onion bug anybody else and nothing with is right of us but psycho psychologist psychiatrist novelists think that childhood is the crucial period it's where we become what we will be have you ever met a psychiatrist wasn't a lady in that case because I don't see you Jenny you regard your childhood as effectively insignificant it wouldn't include anybody else I didn't want about in my long life I have met so many interesting people and I thought that might be worth putting on record really why would the book your father you mentioned very little in your memoir you you said one point he and I were quite different people over the wrong sound for him he was a he went to the First World War and gonna MC and he was a very much about the army type a good athlete county hockey player first was amateur boxer and here I will just difference um he was like strong match of athletics a music I wasn't it wasn't rightful we got all ripened to him he was different your mother you have a performing side clearly and that may have come from her because she she had been a singer yet before the First World War she was trained as a Pardo by 17 we increase in Italy and before she finished her training she also leave at 7 grand opera the first world war came along never my father then army officer and never did it but she was good enough I would say when I was boy I'm told I had a very nice voice when my voice broke it didn't break it's shattered it's perfectly for paying the demon king a mythical pantomime but is useless ringing yes and you you say in the book you were we your words are exceptionally close to your mother I was his and we stayed together if there's no secret about this um I'm not a bit sensitive about it my girl was killed in the war I never yells for me therefore I didn't marry and I knew from the AVA 19 I wasn't here to marry when my mother and I were very close indeed sir why spits UPS we didn't simple as that he lived in the same house until this 1981 age 94 and he was mentally fine right up to the end and physically finally the 92 we were very close indeed but that that decision you made a 19 that you would be alone for the rest of your life that would surprise loss there was many people even if they were bereaved in those circumstances they met other people you never have it's meant to deepen my faith a lot of me would have felt lonely living their life on their own you've called yourself a reluctant bachelor I've well I would like to wife and family of course I will without that wasn't on but certainly I've had plenty of friends all through my life since served the end of the war so I've never been learning from that point of view of course I say I would the like to family but I'd love this move I was never strike me I wouldn't have one but these things happened him blame the later Hitler and I don't want to do too much when I sort of probe too deep into this but Lorna she made such an impact on you even at that age we were absolutely everything so on that was there these things heaven you say you were the wrong in some ways the wrong son for your father but he was a military figure and you you yourself you were determined to fight in the war I didn't want to stay at home and do a certain things that I couldn't do if I gone into the army or the Navy it either lasted 10 minutes well I haven't got the right kind of hard work and I wouldn't have lost it so the one thing I thought I might be able to do is to fly so I didn't say my father served on the first world war with great distinction I served under second the circle Decker distinction buddies are served by surprise given your health history because people were invalided out but you you were able to pass the medical I want them to target on this we have some rather economical with the truth with these things happen look after all of the years of 77 I was for playing cricket from doing well the world and you say in the book again it's tantalizing you say I had a rather interesting war but we'll leave it at that yes millions are there you you haven't you would never go beyond that it's a long time ago it remembers the gift but you haven't forgotten they only and forget you just don't want to tell people that you haven't forgotten I forget enough everything my name is very bad so much have you written it down anyway would it ever be published one day well I began my book really at the end of the war wasn't that's when things started happening to me and I got it all done all kinds of things the economical side and the writing said a game as a immense slice of luck a few days after the war Edna supposes what the London publishers well looking for someone is write a book about the moon and I'd given a little X in London called a guide to the moon the heard about this and contact their American size morsels and I was in fact advice a book about the moon I never look before so I have a go and I would like heat port on and the invites let another one that course on never so that finish my university clearly unfortunate because before the war I had liked English page video and didn't take up and after the war I came this place was still there they would have been taking a government girl because I wasn't fair to start bitter fighting and pay my way through and then rioting took over and never had time I missed Indian when you say you were not prepared to take a government grant why not I prefer to do things on my own I better stand on my own feet I didn't even then and does that does that come from your childhood do you thing from your parents just me I think I see I was like if I say these these moves caught on and I've never been stuck since from that point of view I was a tremendous job no revising my biggest book is taking the best part of the year and the writing of your books is unusual in that the typewriter on which you produce them it will be a hundred years old next year 1908 Woodstock and I'm on that machine with my two middle fingers I could fight back with inaudible herbs minister and now of course I accomplished my hand box right and therefore I'm slow and I make mistakes I never did before and everything takes me ten times as long with an infernal nuisance but it is and you write some you write a chapter for NASA who I think probably expect these things are things to be sent by trip to their mobile phones and that's how we're preparing a book about the moon sometimes a year and there are periodic scepter above the lunar transient phenomena and I witness my sense in I've got the jet Patrick thank you for your chapter this is exactly right right style right length slightly search winterizing willis it could go straight to piss thank you very much then congratulations you're the first water thus ending his chapter in pencil what the bloody hell did you type it on something but there is there is an even older typewriter which I think also at the age of six you were given a much older typewriter my grandfather was 1892 Hemi son abandoned by him was too old fashioned for his office and that was founded often given them you to play with I taught myself to type a thought it's an ideal machine but some you can't do any speed on there because he hits and avail underneath it's good one of the recurring things new life I think in your early life is that you are you're self-taught self-taught as a typist which a lot of people do but also as an astronomy you are self-taught true as how I did it from from books meetings a set had some tremendous piece of luck ever they want to join the British astronomical incision I gained so much from this and the first thing that attracted you in astronomy was the the mapping of the moon well I think in a sauna al-azhar or professional you're bound to specialize in something and in my case it happened to be the moon therefore that's been my main learn the floor made my own TV research was in the joining in the lunar mapping it was on the moon map team of course all the work I did on that is now completely obsolete was now you go for satellites and spacecraft but didn't didn't exist in those days we had to do it then but now of course it belongs to the past is it I regret you at all that you didn't study in astronomy formerly no for two reasons first of all I am so interested I could do what I wanted to and moon has won my particular joy secondly I know my limitations if I get the official genre you've got to be a good mathematician and I am NOT I have not got a net for it mathematical mind and therefore I would never be a fever of theorist so just revert doesn't I miss a when I meant to take my degree I was gonna take my degree in geology first walk was Lula and plentiful geology interests me most and secondly in those days not now in those days the matthew neer for geology once her advances the Geneva story I could just have had the coke to that but I never saw your broadcasting career which has been extraordinary successful you're the longest-running presenter of a single show now but it got off to one be a frightening start to most people because your first broadcast was in French yes how do you broadcast about Venice observed a with the event astronomer royal so health Spencer Jones if only BBC a phone service and with live broadcast and they turn the cameras on survive it's in French team and by the grace of God had dozens but heavy anything else over the done so you were able to discuss that subject in French and how offenses are all right I've been to the porting accent because them during the war I flew with the Belgians I've got a lovely angrily Flemish second and my grammar is not impeccable but I'm alright I translated books from Vince the sky and vibe which has been a very large part of your life and your fame that happened because of you you've made a previous program which heard interest in BBC there poor John Stone the BBC producer we actually an archaeologist who came down for someone to do a regular program on the sonnet the way they hadn't been done quite before and he'd heard me do one broadcast it could I be man so he rang me up bragging seemed so I did and we talked and he goes on and with me therefore we go to a test program he didn't do a test in the a minute straight for me yeah and the BBC said them they will create this program whose earlier once every four weeks four three three months you know it went that was 50 years ago again the huge strides of luck for me I mean the fact this lasted for so long it's not even me at all it's pure the subject and also whenever you're on the only four months the Space Age started up when Sputnik 1 and the storm is suddenly became a headline news did you think at the beginning of as to who might be watching what the audience might be yes I thought everybody what we are trying to give the latest news on the Somme away and keep you up to date without going too deep the invit and again we are lucky because at that stage there was a bright comet and then real they'll come down and have the main subject of our first program and people went looked at it and it just caught on and he suggests that it was very good time to be starting because we'll talk about the space race in a moment but even before that it was also a time when people suddenly got excited about flying saucers the idea that there's something something we all get that the face or the crater girl or even today alien abduction circuit fun I recalled myself as being the most complete skeptic about the idea that flying saucers or spaceships coming from other worlds I did real world of it and I'm quite sure over all the sightings in the explains much more easily than that and to the program called one pair of eyes once and wish I had of flying saucers flat-earthers hollow grabbers in a magically the Sun to be cold you don't think it sounds hot it's not a hot body it cold as heat haunted the Sun itself is is cold well or pretty like the earth what puzzles me a bit is that at the moment I'm sitting here saying this lovely old vicarage and I can see the Sun I can feel what I think is heat on my phone is coming from the Sun well not uh suppose you have an electric generating station it doesn't have to be on fire but you could have an electric radiation only generating station which is completely cold maybe says causing heat on your neck so it doesn't mean the generating station itself has got to be on fire but I think you have a form letter that you send out to correspondents saying you won't answer letters on UFOs the theory that man didn't land on the moon and all the rest of it you're you're quite resistant to the conspiracy theorists it's obviously for them and though I that that I'd sent out that method when I was absolutely inundated with mayor of on stage but no guys live apprised availability and I didn't have seven lives of me youngsters like all the parts of those and say if I'd done that Nick's whole in this world it could be great play around and find well-known amethyst homeless and well-known professionals who began either by working the sky at night or reading when I book suddenly fives on anything worth doing it's that I've done my best I've the codes and it bitter but dr. Shelley there must be many worlds like the earth in the universe surely some of them may be inhabited well by inhabited I suppose you mean inhabited by living forms things that we would call life and the answer to that is I think the power bill is exceedingly high that there's abundant life scattered throughout the universe very early on one of the questions there is you're asking people is there any possibility of life elsewhere in the universe that has been a constant question look at it this way our Sun Lord mister one of a hundred thousand million stars in our galaxy we know of a thousand million galaxies that's any parliament and then here these trials have tennis we knew that therefore they tilted up the world right the earth must be absolutely staggering and I refuse to believe ours at the only form in life but I can't prove it and I think the one thing we don't know if they have a world where life could appear will it well I think maybe answer that soon I for they were clear about life on Mars well d'Arnaud Martin's milk and oils on the other hand there may well be a certain amount of low type life on Mars and before long we should find out and if any trace of life on Mars that we serve a life will appear what it can and after we have it a strong pointer so I'm sober up tentative in some different races up there but there there are light years away and this certain they can't get to us by any means we know and that's a crucial point because the counter-argument often put is that if there were life there would have been some kind of contact by now the distances are so vast you can't send a rocket to of the nearest stars we take far too long and think I suspended animation don't there they work and we start talking about time warps space warps teleportation for travel that is shared science fiction but television between science fiction and a few centuries ago and we may be as near to the exotic forms thirdly weather television if we are ever going to contact those other civilizations which must exist it's got to be done I think by some method about which we know absolutely nothing at the present moment and I suspect we are just about as far away from that kind of thing as King Canute was from television game Paks my very first program 26th of April 1957 is virtually all television was live in those days you were relatively an experienced presenter so 10:30 at night the light goes on were you terrified I wasn't terrified me I've got about as many nerve the various rhinoceros when it comes to their cunning but I do remember seeing them on the screen a regular on monthly program presented by peptic more and I thinking then my entire career depends on what I do dream of 20 minutes and of course it did television was quite scary in those days because huge numbers of things could go wrong that would happen earlier said to them I will swallow the large file the news Nevers go to him and the the Russian came to take bars and didn't speak any English all kinds of things happened we had the famous 15 sky at night and they really get to show a juvenile assessor first in the scale and we had a big tears kept down fighting where George Earle was and the five is before the program and five disheartened ended the sky was clear in the program infant album it done he had to store what we planned to do was to start off by showing you some stars I then go on to the moon then Jupiter and finally the most spectacular thing of all Saturn obtain it with the Rings which never has been shown before on Direct television George what do you think I think we're nearly totally obscured Patrick I saw to Peter a few moments ago I can see it now it's gonna be a things about which we can do absolutely nothing at all George can you see anything at all because there you go can you see there know whether I can get on right the star Vega which that the thing that wanted to show you it's a bright blue star right above us as I said earlier on and with any luck now we will be able to get the filler scoop on it I can see it quite clearly and I think we just get just about gonna have time to show it to you but of course there's still a lot of drifting cloud up there me just can't tell whether it's gonna be obscured at the critical moment of course you won't see the girl looking large because no telescope yet built will show a star gone on the cross was black right here absolutely nothing we can do about it I can't move a 24 inch telescope quicker than that no I'm afraid you can't well did it worth keeping it there do you think but how where else to pointed now I'm afraid not and the space race was very good for you and the skydivers you say create a great excitement in what was going on the Space Age started I mean as recently as 1950 there were little people that said we'd never get to the moon and certainly never get further well Oliver that all vanished with the launch of Sputnik 1 and the quantify total yearly Gagarin questions out of them say men put go into space and will write in the space ace it was that boost of the pills obviously do you regret this I find that I have children who are scarcely even aware that man went to the moon and is it all stopped do you regret that I'm not so that educated America though but after all them it's all depends upon teaching doesn't it and that's not terribly good these days the space race fair it seems to have slowed down to have effectively stopped there's no longer a space face there certainly was but not for a long time now the space program seems was live down but only in one sense men's space research hasn't a guess too quickly as people expected from the number of reasons so via Americans for all their cosmic eggs into one basket the Space Shuttle to talk longer than it opened their faults and costs more and a couple of very nasty accidents and the Russians run out of money except the man species I said slow down although yet now had the International Space Station but unmanned Space Research bets are very different story prove that all of that space villages you know ten times what we did huge space is everything there sir but unmanned sir as nozzle so the Australian dollar is only apparent and if you do get your gear back to lunar and I think we have a lunar base roughy did the middle of the Apollo program Apollo eight to Apollo 11 that as a reporter and being involved in it that must have been one of the great spells of your life I'm wearing two hats because I've only NASA Committee if I was in northern that side and if I'm not doing the BBC reporting from here so I was dodging to and fro but here in the United States there was a fascinating period and of course um Apollo 11 was the climax when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin stepped out onto the scene think of the day and as we never came down I was thank the nervous remember it had me done before had they made a fortune anchoring in any way they couldn't go back and that would be in two cars in Reverse so my hub deals was coming through I felt good sense believe and again when they blasted back into orbit from the balloon there's one sentence that had to work properly first time and that's what he did then it was Apollo 13 that was a near disaster but it was luck skill or played way go away with him but I think the Apollo program was finally called off and enthusiastic who I am I'm sure the rice tea service Apollo had done was he could land a man on the moon research there and depth instruments but doing it out another parts a little antiquated but not in fundamental and sooner or later something would have gone wrong and I didn't leave now there will be anymore first on the moon until there is risky profession that's true come before too many years I think rested nap is reading accounts of those Apollo the first moon landings there was which passed people didn't realize now there was genuine fear it was not at all clear that they could get the astronauts back the main one was upon him just a journey Gagarin's first open space Pepa the vital one no one knew how the human fear moved yet we have rich people at the moment buying tickets to go into space do you regret that that is not something you will ever experience I'd love to go very massive Rogers wants me have you did would you they'd like to have done it of course I will but I never had a sense of the right age wrongness Galatea no qualifications at all I never had the chance for him I'm already part of the effect they did have a very small input in my mood mapping Apollo 8 there was a broadcasting problem which is that as the BBC have done in other things on other occasions they cut away at the wrong moment I was in the third game and there on the air live and Apollo 8 had gone round the moon and I said something this effect the men that operate are now on the far side of the moon they're coming on and in listeners there come around the edge and will be able to hear them we hope the command on time was helpful they've carried out a very risky maneuver so I all say no more now in the field heck we hear the voices of the first men random element and this is one of the great moments in human history and the BBC change over the Jackanory reading the books of some of the astronauts a lot of them seem to being quite profoundly affected by the experience of better Gene Cernan telling with them when he was on the moon the things affected him most was looking up and see his home a quarter of a million miles away Bantu official obviously I think I'm I wonder if the first man on Mars has been born it's pornea that would be I mean even more difficult to mount a mission than the Polly want a thermal is it plausible leaving I think they're two reasons that may hold things out the first is radiation once you're beyond the atmospheric for you know exposed warm kinds or unpleasant radiations or on the mill you get away therefore P period on Mars weeks to get there on your the whole thing on Mars itself in incomplete protection and the journey home so radiation is a problem and never quite know yet how bad it is or how to convert it that's one problem the second of course is do we want to go for one more war I've made major war and we're back in the Stone Age and that could have never fit a very long career with the sky Knight we've had various presenters we've had Nick Ross of crime watch recently leaving the program after 23 years apparently told that they had to think about the age profile of the program have you ever suffered from that at the BBC not a bit I'll follow I've been there for a long time everyone knew that I'm now a t4 if they want to lead pace me I wouldn't go I've been there for a long time and so we do have not crystalline sauce no ma'am I know if I first meet him with Chris I give him to give a lecture at the Torquay boys school and the Livni little boy came and started talking to me and I thought this is often used in India that Oldham I think keep it to be cultivated that was Chris well good yeah I bite him on the program he's now clear presenter and he had all the advantages that I haven't first of all he's got a first class mathematical plane you've got been awarded TVs now he's a good presenter too and he enjoys doing it so he would certainly be a better president than I am would you want the program to continue after you oh yes most certainly there will be no thanks to me I believe the program has done good it's brought people in so strongly and certainly has encouraged those to take it up so yes I wanted to continue like Christ loved the world and you would want Chris to take it over from you he'd be a eminently suitable apart from your sky at night career there has been another side to your television life which has been comedy light entertainment sending yourself up in a fact I did by Norfolk in myself well should I hit those it's great fun I don't there are all kinds of people what are you studying at the moment what your particular investigations lead you to study now you're talking to me yes northern stars ah northern stars which find a particular Proxima Centuri Proxima Centauri no that is a fascinating star isn't it amazing to reflect that when you look at Proxima you're seeing if it was four years ago the light from Proxima takes over this mr. Markham yes the star Altair are the light from that takes 16 years to eat your scallops from viga 27 years shut up from arrival 800 years yes special pricing for Alpha Sigma even prefer I prefer from the artistic guide yes 1500 years did you ever worry that it would detract from the seriousness no not a bit the reason being him when I do that kind of thing I'm having fun well I'm in the stronger I'm a serious astronomer and I don't mix the two if I know that that makes us ooh therefore the insula and being impersonated some people get sensitive about this but you've um you've rather enjoyed being impersonated by people I can take mr. Li once um Michael Ellis Carver my there and I city but you got my scar wrong what's new why did we put the sky tonight on earlier in the summertime say this was a scar I got doing the war cooperation over the cataract caught the see Affleck being the jaws of death x-ray I can run off my melt about 1952 so is what is not apart from not talking about your war record do you make up versions of it you mentioned having written the book because of some of the people you'd met I mean some some of those are very striking and Einstein for example I met him once smile as a boy they're flying cleaning different conference I was invited to and Einstein was there and I was able to talk to him he was you know an expert violinist and he had to have his birthday be playing some work and some of the supporting terror sexual violence why plays a swamp does never companies there was a penny of their sounds whole swarm I knew the accompaniment so I have a company dance I'll go for a tape well the would be the tapes did things I also met them the first airman all the rice every interesting tell me about that I measure the same conference he didn't dive in 1948 he did very little flying after 1920 he was so sad his airplane had been used in warfare and even about the feeling into the background you were a very pleasant unassuming kind of man what about Einstein was there any sense of the the charisma of e he was exactly what you'd expect charming courteous after this world exact he's enough mankind to be you were a very young man at the you were known as the kid in his own raf years but were you in all of these people I didn't think I was as have no I can't really say that I was I was fascinated and honored to meet them officer Clark who was a friend for a long time still is still is but he he is someone that you knew from early on we are both P War members of the British interplanetary society met with Ralph and I was met and we've enclosed friends ever since he lives of course now in Sri Lanka we talk on the phone and in aids of the bank of disaster fund we put together a little book about asteroids and we thirteen or fourteen thousand tons were found you are listed in some places as music consultant on 2001 a Space Odyssey is that true I think it is anyone pitch I'm having dinner with Arthur and the one don't really to use for the space see because I said use the Blue Danube and they did though with another way that came from me I don't know leper my only connection there but Sir they had to say you've lived a Neil but they did it would have been a big coincidence if it isn't from you something to be proud of our things yeah it's an amazing film another connection you have with arthur c clarke you've done less of it than him but science fiction you you have is an area you have written it is with the hell sales of boys books and the boys not was on science fiction and of record they're just get to be published again called pure being trying to get them in compton being decided to we've got them put them all the way but she appeared in verses saying your mother wrote a book towards the end of her life didn't she she what mrs. Mullins pays for her love d cartoon let me there how drawing your morals and we put their together how was the thick founders and since they have missing more in space with her one in the book he was then 88 I may say Sheila marvelous artist if I had one spark of artistic ability I try and develop it but I am so there's no point music consultant as we say to 2001 would we think but um you would also have been a composer your saddle on music yes um the last thing I was I think was named the band of the Royal paratrooper gays wanted a new March right at the march out of the sky for them but for lasting I live for this admit I've written them occurred two or three operas Theseus cursed she's a nice one getting nails getting put on the Cambridge for a fortnight and they're bad they're not the form right and then I just a third for haunts and then a week in cheese's huh and then a one down here the story of Galileo not quite according to the history books and you told me your mother was a singer so she had musical interest but she encouraged you to play in stores yes I can't remember the time I wasn't trying to play the piano and I did for if it's a very small boy and I remember also when I was 8 sitting at Piron again now this is silly I can't even write music though I meant to bought a book and taught myself I've never a good sight leader and again this comes out at virtually everything you've done you have taught yourself and that particular respect yes suppose if I know nothing about the theory of music at all I was nauseous marshes and they'd be pleased learned quite a lot I have got one thing that's no previous to me at all don't get me wrong it's no pretty to me right I've got perfect pitch imperfect opponents medical stuff help do you ever wish that the writing that the novels for example the music that that had been a bigger part of your life I wouldn't have alter the Astronomy at all I wish they'd had more time for music in writing but um you can't figure everything in I used to wake up in the wind within our what have I got time to do today although most TV appearances have generated great affection some of his personal opinions have led people to wonder what planet he's on he supports the United Kingdom Independence Party which campaigns against ties with Europe and in favor of tighter immigration controls mores autobiography contain provocative complaints about gender and racial equality and there's further controversy over comments in a recent interview about the BBC being taken over by women television has changed a great deal in those 50 years you find television less a less happy place now than at the beginning did you oh not going to us happy for me because I've never been involved I'm not BBC employee I'm not involved in that kind of thing so all I mean I'm sure go politic service in which I don't get involved so it doesn't affect me a bit the programs obviously have changed but then they go on and you say recently that it's because of women there are too many women in TV what I said was this originally the BBC was untitled entirely male dominated in the pendulum swung what I have just said was is swaying a bit too far that's what I said the course but pistol comes of course we expect that but if it's what if it swung too far then then there are too many women in television anything there were too many men when there were too many men was that a problem I said there are too many men that have published it we want the happy medium and we all really we all get that most certainly not fold television does have a extremely important role to play now far more serve I think anyone expected powerful at the end of the war television was more than just coming on and never really expected to take theirs so it's more important than any mind kata teams and therefore you've got to have a happy meal I never for John's friend telling me he believes to program in 1938 I think three politicians it's over then PI 1 hour and 40 minutes which he wouldn't be likely now know I hope you thought about this the people were seeing your views your political views it's complicated because you are against fox hunting they notably but in general people have classed you as a man of the right some have even said the far right like I think I stand for sensible politics I see I must have I do wrong to party I belong to you clip you know I think him independence party for some I'm far too old to do anything so far as hot fox hunting is concerned people enjoy that must come from another clan dispelling concern for their be office if we walk alike are in particular use Minh I keep out of that kind of thing these days the time I got left I got so much I want to do my main thing I just provided my big actors to the universe and I've got survived had deemed 8 o'clock now and cuz I just booked with Brian May and crystalline sauce for Bang and well-pleasing this he will bang up to the it the swords go get fun you say in your memoirs very provocatively to a lot of people you say the worst acts of parliamentary legislation in history were the sexual discrimination act and the race relations act all the villains do you think I don't like that today if that acts that only apply in one direction so what I say I'm not in that field now I'm time too busy with my astronomical work and also I hope laugh music I I'd like a little bit more than I can I never was a good player I was a composer I did play the xylophone in the world come on performance run stones I enjoyed that but I want the good player black I could write for other people this I hope I could but the reason just going back to that game back to sorry you're not you ain't talking on your politics at all I've no interest when there were hills but you put you put them in your memoirs I know them very briefly very briefly very briefly and I had one question arising from that page in your memoirs which is that you say don't like legislation gay in one direction the reason somebody would say that was introduced was to redress a balance that there had not been equality for non-white people there had not been equality for women and it needed to be occurred as a melon black why for cocky or familial game builds if you like you won't live their own ideas here the opposition to Fox something they which confuses some people who wish to position you on the right and what what makes you so opposed to fox hunting I don't like needless call him and never gonna die of fox hunting is needlessly cruel I'll fraud can you enjoy cheers again world is dropping and then seeing it torn to bits by dogs if and I'll enjoy that must come from another planet and is not me some people which is why they use the phrase that clay will phrase the heavens looking at the sky makes them think about God and eternity and all the rest of it has it ever had that effect on you the sky is a wondrous place we wonder how far does it go and what's up there I'm sure there are many races up there far more intelligent than we are full of a difficult see whether they'll contact us I don't know but one thing I do say but some people who say we shouldn't try to contact other races but if I come with the Congress I didn't think that's there is reason being quite simply it's for other races Montel that we are they ever put war behind them otherwise they wouldn't they wouldn't survive so if they do contact us I mean why isn't we are I mean II didn't feel them what Stephen Hawking called the G word he wrote the word God at the end of his book a brief history of the universe have you ever been moved to thoughts of God I had one call with a liquid Vicar down here mysterious area scroll he dropped two caches off the inscriptions aim over one about off my fast 1 EPSA I miss you know leave a very good feel of us and then in the flooring match he made 30 or 40 drivers in at number 11 I had to stay there because his handlers and I stayed and I can't better my left that's what Freddie Freeman is supposed to have said to the Reverend David Shepherd isn't he pretend it's Sunday and keep your hands together when he dropped the couch say I never hear is cleared for two reasons first of all people what kind of to say that my unusual spin Bernie would carry a good car cricket you carry a number 11 bet you can't carry a field as bad as I am and I'm an appalling field I can't catch I can't stop I can't throw a bus lower house in the field of Petra and had I ever wanted to miss here's cricket that was directly but and I didn't intervals I'm gonna have a third go this I may not get anywhere but I mean was it that astronomy has driven some people to quite deep thoughts of God other people to very strong atheism I just wondered where on that scale you can think of balance so here's our so mush up there we don't know about and our knowledge is fragmentary you know more you can't for judgment thank you do you think about death it happened to be one day do you do you fear it no do you you mentioned this in the orthography and at the beginning of this interview the infirmities of old age have been an irritation to you so don Dusen's us there were only a few years ago I paint innocent fakers and now I can't most annoying there it is I had a long run you've got to accept these things nothing you do about it your mind though is clearly very strong and intact is that luck or have you done anything eyes ears what possible blame I'm not affected yes my board if it is or I say I'll go on talk of the chem but there always am we open the newspapers there all these things about it's very important to do crosswords in order to keep your brain intact and so swirls I banish the one close old was a flightless bird the theatres but you know any and any with you that's all that one but have you have you done anything to keep yourself mentally alert or active yes I'm studying all the time you like you've got to keep a best of everything first I do I thought if I couldn't do this kind eyes miss I keep the best investor nautical stuff and that time that does keep all work foster forbidden it keeps you working very nicely the sky ignites as you've suggested you you will do you'll go I'm doing for as long as you possibly can as long as they want me to because you want me to go on and people like do I do I'll continue if they don't you think I'm too old I'm not doing it well then I'll stand down and I say the first really a bad program ideal does it be my fault that'll be my last aunty do you ever watch them and think I have made a mistake and I have done something wrong I've had many things I could do better miss certainly sir a large part of your life has been discovery finding things out what are the things you would still most like to know I love them all about the origin of the universe above all I'd like to know is there intelligent life up there I'm sure the reason I can't prove it and I think be a pointer even in my lifetime probably because if they find any trace of life on Mars that's also life will appear when it can something said to me if a flying saucer landed my garden and to the man came before that's a I would say good afternoon a tea or coffee she's coming even News TV studio but even in the 50 years you've been broadcasting most of what we have found out hers argued against the existence of life hasn't it no I think what I think what reverse we knew the other many worlds like the earth where life can appear the only then there will life appear what it can I think Mars may give us the clue they're elusive does it really give us a good point up Patrick Moore thank you very much nice to talk to you you

Channel: Alican Demirel

Views: 7,171

Rating: 4.884058 out of 5

Keywords: Sir Patrick Moore, Patrick Moore, Space, Astronomy, NASA, Apollo

Id: 8r9cfUsbBNo

Length: 55min 18sec (3318 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 18 2014