I wonder if any of the climate change deniers who post on this web site think highly of Bill Nye ("The Science Guy") in regards to what he says about science and in regards to his integrity. If any of them think highly of him, then I encourage them to consider what he says about climate change.
Bill Nye takes climate change seriously and he says that climate change is real, that is now largely human caused, that is scares him, and that humans need to take action to fight climate change - including voting to stop climate change.
in the quotes below, the boldface (but the not the wording) was added me to me for emphasis.
I have a hardcover edition of a book by Bill Nye called Everything All At Once (copyright 2017). He addresses much of his book to nerds (and Nye identifies as a nerd). A day or so ago I noticed that pages 110-111 say the following.
'We nerds, scientists, and fellow travelers have a two-part responsibility here. First, we have to fight back against people who actively try to devalue the knowledge that we have fought so hard to gain. I believe we have to defend scientific ideas, and even more importantly, we have to defend the scientific process, the principle of being open to new information. We have to actively promote the philosophy that everyone knows something you don't. ... We also need to have sympathetic discussions (I mean instead of loud arguments) about human-caused climate change.
... I've heard too many climate "debates" that consist of deniers saying climate change is a hoax and the ostensibly pro-science people responding that the deniers are either thoughtless idiots or amoral evildoers. Look I am very familiar with how frustrating it can be to talk with people who reject scientific evidence, but I'm pretty sure that nobody has ever changed his or her mind as a result of being called an idiot.
We need to hold accountable the leaders of the climate-denialist movement, the enemies of the idea that everyone knows something you don't. We need to expose what they do not know and discredit them. At the same time, we need to find ways to spread information and real evidence in a way that inspires confidence and trust. Wherever possible, we must work to vote the troublemakers out of office, exposing their corruption and offering a clear alternative that will actually protect and uplift us all. And who is this "we" I'm talking about? It is all of us. A meaningful response to climate change will take more scientific research and engineering solutions. It will also take lobbying, public outreach, community organizing, get-out-the-vote drives, and corporate support.'
On pages 183-184 and on page 193 of his book Bill Nye addresses a number of the claims repeated by some climate deniers who posted in this topic thread
On pages 183-185 Bill Nye says the following.
'On Earth, the global average temperature is about 15°C (58°F). On Venus, the average temperature is about 460°C (860°F). Venus is closer to the Sun, but that doesn't explain the drastic difference .... What really sets Venus apart form our planet is its atmosphere, which is 90 times as thick as Earth's and made almost entirely of carbon dioxide. All that CO2 produces a super-greenhouse effect, and as the result is a world where even the coolest day would melt a lead fishing weight into a puddle.
... Comparing Earth with Venus is a pedagogical path that Carl Sagan took us down when I was his student 2 decades earlier. Sagan and climate scientist James Hansen realized that the greenhouse effect explains the other planet's extreme temperatures. later they connected the Venusian studies to the possibility of climate change on Earth.
... I've been fighting the climate-change fight for more than 23 years now, along with many others out there, the full-time climate scientists. Hansen, the former director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, did an early study conclusively showing that carbon dioxide produced by human activity is making the world get warmer faster than at any time in the past few hundred thousand years. Michael Mann at Pennsylvania State University produced the famous "hockey stick" graph illustrating the world's temperature over the past several thousand years. Earth's overall temperature was steady for millennia, but now--woosh-it has shot up swiftly in just the last 250 years. Gavin Schmidt, who succeeded Hansen at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, advances and refines our climate models by the day. But in a world filled with people who willfully promote misinformation to further their own agenda, somehow it is still a fight to get this reality taken seriously. ... What it means is that we need to embrace the Sagan approach even more vigorously. Take the long view. Be resolute but remain optimistic. Relate ideas in ways that people understand through clear storytelling and personal connections.
... What I want to do is get everybody in the United States, everybody in the world, on board with the exciting opportunities. We don't want our greenhouse effect to get away from us. As Sagan warned, we do not want to be like Venus. We can produce clean electricity in new ways. ... The jobs to create the renewable economy would be here on native soil. We've seen a recent eruption of populist politics around the world, propelled in part by complains about the loss of local control of the economy. Well, if you want locally produced energy, you are not going to do better than wind, solar, geothermal, and tidal energy. It's yet another instance in which the best, nerd-certified solution ends up benefiting everyone.
Part of the reason for this book is to enlist your help ... --getting you to be part of the resonance. Help people link extreme weather events with the global warming that makes those kinds of events more likely. Help people understand that renewable energy comes with local control. Connect the inspiring discoveries of space exploration with the things we now understand about the danger of rapid climate change on our own planet. Making these conceptual and personal connections is a very Carl Sagan way of communicating the science. I'm sure it works, because I've seen it work.'
Bill Nye says the following on pages 193-194 of his book.
'With this said, we are living in a weird time for critical thinking. Climate change is a prime example. Several decades ago, scientists started seeing indications that the whole world is getting warmer overall. Since then they have gathered enormous amounts of data to verify and quantify the discovery. The claim today is quite specific: Earth's temperature is rising, and industrial emissions are the primary cause. it is testable, and nearly all climate scientists will tell you that the evidence for human-driven global warming has in fact been tested and thoroughly verified. Yet a determined collection of climate-change deniers has managed to sow doubt here at the testability stage. They question the researchers' motivations. They question the quality and the quantity of the evidence, implying (incorrectly) that there is not extremely strong agreement within the climate-research community. That is why some scientists and science journalists push back, noting that there is about a 97 percent consensus that humans are driving climate change. Their point is not that a mob must be right. It is more an appeal to Occam's razor. it would take quite an elaborate conspiracy to get that many people to sign on to bad or crooked results. The far simpler explanation is that the researchers are doing exactly what they appear to be doing, gathering the best-available data and subjecting it to the best-possible analysis.
None of the climate counterclaims seem worthwhile to me, but I take the need for critical thinking seriously. This is a great opportunity for you to apply the standard of "prove it" for yourself. I think it is worthwhile to work through how you even know such a basic fact as the roundness of the Earth. So by all means--when it comes to climate change and global warming, I encourage everyone to evaluate the preponderance of evidence and to examine the publications by climate experts. As a critical thinker, you are like a juror in a very important trial, perhaps the most important one ever. The case here is one that will determine the welfare of billions of people.
Have at, my fellow nerd!'
The web page at https://billnye.com/documentary is a about a documentary about Bill Nye. It says the following.
'Bill Nye is a man on a mission: to stop the spread of anti-scientific thinking across the world.
... his behind-the-scenes portrait of Nye follows him as he takes off his
Science Guy lab coat and takes on those who deny climate change,
evolution, and a science-based world view. The film features Bill Nye,
Neil deGrasse Tyson, Ann Druyan, and many others." Ann Druyan was the wife of Carl Sagan.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/28/crosswords/bill-nye-climate-change-crossword.html says the following.
'In
big discussions about climate change and Earth’s future, “words are
really important,” Nye said. He criticized the way in which recent
climate conversations have been handled on a global scale.
“The words are always watered down,” he said, pointing to discussions at
COP26, a United Nations climate conference.
... When people say humans are likely to be responsible for climate change,
“that’s different from saying it’s our fault,” Nye said. The phrases
“climate change” and “global warming” are just two sides of the same
coin, he said. And while the conversation about the warming planet can
feel daunting, Nye believes that “everybody should be anxious about
climate change.”
... “Global
warming” has gradually been replaced, in many instances, by “climate
change,” Deborah Tannen, a linguistics professor at Georgetown
University, said. One disadvantage of the phrase “global warming” is
that it can be taken to mean only increasing temperatures, so other
catastrophic effects may not seem connected, Tannen said. “Global
warming” acknowledges the overall trend toward warmer temperatures, but
it largely neglects local effects, which are experienced as shifts in
extremes, the climate scientist and Harvard professor Marianna Linz
said. Those extremes could include heat, but they could also be
droughts, floods or tornadoes.
Nye
said that while taping the show in the ’90s, he was “concerned” about
the future of the United States. “I still am,” he added.
“People are frightened by climate change, and they should be,” Nye said. “It’s a scary proposition.” '
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/04/bill-nye-the-best-way-to-fight-climate-change-is-by-voting.html says the following.
'The best way to save the planet isn't necessarily recycling – it's stepping into a voting booth.
That's according to celebrity science educator Bill Nye, television's "The Science Guy," who spoke at the Aspen Ideas Festival
in Aspen, Colorado, last week. "To be sure, recycling the bottles,
don't throw the plastic away [and] compost your compostable things ...
Start there," Nye said. "[But] if you want to do one thing about climate
change: Vote."
"And, if you're a kid and you can't vote yet, make sure your parents vote," Nye, 66, added. "Hassle them."
... Nye pointed to laws that would attach fees or taxes to carbon emissions
as examples of legislation that might move the needle on climate
change, because affecting the wallets of both individuals and
corporations could help curtail the sort of behavior that results in
exorbitant carbon usage.
"Take
the environment into account [when voting]," he said. "Don't just vote
for, with respect, dumb stuff. Vote for better laws to control climate
change."
...
At Aspen, Nye said the best solution to increasingly powerful storms is reducing greenhouse gas emissions across the globe.
"What
you would do is reduce greenhouse gas emissions, so the world doesn't
get warm as fast as it's getting warm," he said. "The problem is the
ocean is getting warm and then all of this energy that's being stored in
the ocean leads to [increased convection] and these big hurricanes." '
https://www.ecowatch.com/bill-nye-climate-denial-politics.html says the following.
'Acosta began the interview by asking Nye how the climate crisis had
impacted Hurricane Ian, which inundated some parts of Florida with a
total rainfall only seen once every thousand years.
“This hurricane is exactly the kind of thing that’s predicted by every climate model,” Nye said.
The science educator mentioned three ways that Ian behaved in keeping with climate models:
- Its strength
- Its size
- The fact that it intensified rapidly before making landfall
“The energy that drives a hurricane is heat,” Nye explained. “As the atmosphere gets warmer, the heat ends up in the ocean.”
He
then went on to detail how slightly cooler air forces the warm ocean
air upwards, where it hits the stratosphere and is transformed into a
circular storm by the forces of gravity and the Earth’s rotation.
... Nye’s remarks to conservatives came as he was discussing what to do
about climate change. He mentioned a plethora of solutions from
improving infrastructure to building more trains. But he said one thing
was standing in the way of any potential solution.
“If we don’t acknowledge there’s a problem, we’re not going to get it done,” he said.
He then called out Republican lawmakers specifically.
“And
so I just want to ask conservative lawmakers to cut it out,” he said.
“I understand that you want to get reelected. I understand that you have
this primary system which motivates you to get these hardcore
conservative voters engaged. But look, you’ve just, just cut it out.”
... This isn’t the first time that Nye has gotten political in the face of climate denial. In 2017, he called the Trump administration the “last gasp of the anti-science movement.” In 2018, he challenged Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
over his approval of the controversial Trans Mountain pipeline
expansion. He is also a disaster expert. He hosts The End is Nye on
Peacock, in which he outlines how to survive natural disasters using science.'
