in good hands. god bless you all. thank-you. [applause] . .

and we feel it's important to know that research gets to you on our public. i would also like to welcome this evening one of the most important scientists, the secretary. [applause] you revealed a straightforward and timeless human question and the question is who are we. to charge and understand the path that led us to this moment as a species to know where we came from is also workshop to be

shaped boat stuff the work from the beginning. science is the compass that provides a direction along that often very complex path. when he took on the challenge of the public debate at the head of the creation museum he went into this nationally televised event with an arsenal assembled over the course of a long career as a science educator and although almost all reports of the d-day to know that he would score the evolution it turns out that it was just the beginning. it was a new phase of his work as an educator and it revealed that a serious educator and serious scientist can make a difference for all of us. his insistence that consider creationism has a place in the science classroom is harmful only to our children not only to our children that the future of

the greater world as well and it led him to write this book undeniable. i have to say a look at the questions questions in a number of people were trying to figure out why he couldn't resist the pun off putting his name right in front of the title but he resisted. this book has also led him here to us tonight where he will talk about why this is so important to hand by science and science education will be keys to bring us closer to knowing who we are. joining him and what i know will be a lively conversation is npr science correspondent and moderator for the other smithsonian events including the behind the science interview series. please join me in welcoming bill nye. [applause]

there's a lot of people here. do you know him? that's pretty good. i have to say this -- jealous about -- >> i have to say this because it's really bad. you are the science guy and there is nothing that rhymes with that so i haven't been able to come up with anything. >> this would be a good crowd sourcing question. we are going to talk a while

about the book and about what i'm curious about is tell us how this whole thing came to be. you are sitting quietly in your room minding your own business and they say why don't go to kentucky and have a debate. >> a couple things about that, sitting quietly is still a problem for me. you probably know david sin. this is a long time ago he started a column in the san francisco chronicle. one thing led to another. my attorney wrote him a letter and talked to him on the phone and they said besides mr. davidson, key davidson the science guy doesn't really

brian. the reason i went with bill nye the science guy -- that's really good. true story. [laughter] so the answer is in genesis. and this other guy contacted me through my agent several times over the course of a year, and it was the result of iowa's on big think. somebody must have. anyway, i was tired and i had gotten up at 5 a.m. new york time and i just -- they asked me about creationism and i said knock yourself out that we don't want to have our kids raised to believe that the earth is six or 7000-years-old. it had 7 million views or something. so they contacted me and we

agreed even giuliani sentence is creationism a viable model of something. [laughter] in the modern era. and i thought that it would be like a college kid. [laughter] it would be fine. but it's gone crazy. and so i guess i still am working on a book about climate change and the other kennedys and sustainability and this or that and my publisher said you've got to do it about evolution. so the first week in march i started on this. >> host: that's fast for for a book. >> i hope all of you buy a

carton. >> they make wonderful gifts. you are kind of dating yourself when you say a terminal. [laughter] >> so i made sketches to give you an idea how fast it went and i thought they will hire that these are my drawings. so if you say i don't like your printing, i am sorry. >> you signed them. this is also true in the tavern in seattle and asks me is bill nye your real name and i said it's william. this is when the microbrews were a new thing.

why did you change it? [laughter] i don't know. have another beer. >> when you went into that what were your expectations >> so those guys pay to me and gave away every penny. this creation thing is across the river from ohio to change across the river they really do and especially to the national center for science education.

>> she stepped down, didn't she? >> she has been fighting the good fight for decades. with this organization trying to track every state legislature, county school board, city school board that attempts to sneak to the creation science into a curriculum or into a text book or something and i'm sure she does other things as well but she tries to stop it and go out and find people who will go to the legislatures.

they have the school board members put in front of the voters and you can convince people that they have a point of view is there anything i could say that would change your mind? >> and you hit it on the head. that is the essence. i met her recently at vanderbilt. her name is, my good friend, her name is tracy moody and she runs a website called friendly atheist. there are some stars 6,000

light-years away to get here at 6,000 years. and of course as you may recall if you watch this day said nothing would change. imagine if you are the jury accused of something. if they can do what they want. it's a free country so they say. they have complete or thorough curriculum where they end up turn eight young people. it's a big deal with them. dvds and workbooks. they look just like science tests. there's the tests and

mitochondria and at the bottom -- and the earth is 6000-years-old. it's not in anybody's best interest to raise a generation of science students that cannot reason if it doesn't have a critical thinking skill and that's where they cross the line >> so the question is to me can you have faith and be a critical thinker or does it rule you out if it is something you believe is supernatural? >> i would say supernatural. let me say that i'm sure each and every one of us be leaves in something we have no evidence for, don't you think like fish like me. [laughter] there's something that we believe that there is no evidence. that is what will win the world

series. >> are there any cuts to this. [laughter] so everybody look i grew up in washington and i was a senators fan and i know for historical reasons there are some orioles fans here. it's very troubling. [laughter] they used to come to washington and they would play with like seven different guys and they would have one outfielder and he would be smoking a cigarette. i just hope they do well next year. >> believing in something you can't prove. >> so the nationals are going to win. >> we are just about out of

time. >> we all believe in something there is no evidence for it but that's fine as long as you keep it separate from the process of science and critical thinking. so, i know that for example some of my best friends are catholic and if they get a lot of community, a lot of strength from sharing this experience and i understand that, but that doesn't mean the earth is 6000-years-old. it just can't be coming and that the pope issued a statement that's great but that isn't an extraordinary thing. it's news i guess but it seems to me the catholic church has had sort of an enlightened view of many things for decades now. there's a couple centuries when they were not so great at stuff right now. [laughter]

>> so as long as we keep it separate. >> that evolution is just one of the places where public opinion for religious reasons or not seems to disagree with a scientific evidence like climate change or vaccinations were even genetically modified organisms as that we can talk more about that. so what is your role as a science educator to change that? >> i'm working as hard as i can, dare i say, to change the world. as i talk about the the grownups that made their mind on creationism, i don't know if all of them go as far as 6,000 years

they they had the science education expert on that and grownups are not going to change their mind. it is really hard into the people that are exposed to that at a young age have a hard time. the first time you hear smoking cigarettes are bad for you coming you're not going or not going to quit. it takes chipping away for years, decades before somebody will change his or her mind about something that they are brought up in and i respect the difficult it is to change their mind but on the other hand, it is important and because, for example, in the case of the answers in genesis they are straight into the climate change is not a problem. it is a part of their package. and that's wrong and you just don't want that as a citizen.

you don't want people the buying everything that we can see in nature. >> you've got an audience of over 2,000 people here. what is the role of changing things? >> with regards to everything? there is one thing that we can do and just talk about that is talk about climate change. i think right now i am coming to believe that one of the biggest things about climate change is that it's too easy to set aside and rationalize that if we were all talking about it all the time i think that it would get get into public conversation in a way that would allow us to vote in a more enlightened fashion and change the world at. talk with your friends about climate change. when i was getting out of the

cab, the cab driver claimed that his buddy in new york was under 5 feet of snow and it's november. it's not even thanksgiving. coincidence it could be. it's hiding in the cold weather events it's quite difficult. but in this one example of the one cab driver. that is consistent and i will state categorically that certain events have been tied in an explicitly to climate change even texas and so on and it's such an odd thing when you travel the world and i bet most of you have been to more places than i have but when you talk to

civilized people everywhere else they are very concerned about climate change and and there's nobody running around those countries. the earth is 6000-years-old. there's nobody doing that. >> what i like is we were talking about this backstage comedy engineers building the buildings for the future. they are not part of the discussion of is it real or is it not they are building the buildings with the high year sea level in mind and it seems as if there is a disconnect between the reality on the ground for people that have to do things and people elsewhere who talk about them. >> of the classic if you want to get serious about the conservative objectivity, the military command a u.s. military has all kinds of plans around climate change and some of it if you read the language it is dispassionate to the point of being creepy. since there will be more droughts and wars we may need more weapons.

that's good. thanks for that tip. [laughter] and so it is troubling that everybody is in on it except so many of us aren't. so if we were talking about climate change every day, just a part of the everyday conversation in the way people used to talk about racism and people are in the skeptic community, i am involved in skeptics and the center for scientific inquiry we talk and admire the,, transsexual, transgender community because they've been very successful drawing attention to their issues so people just kind of accept it. okay it's part of our world. so in the same way if we were

talking about climate change enough i think we would be doing something about it. >> is climate change more important that people get fast and forget about evolution so we can live with all of the ideas or do they really have to go together? >> it is all one thing to me. there's a treaty and sweet and that's been been made to be over 9500-years-old. you can go to a park in california and they will be over 6000-years-old. so you can't be serious. >> he will say, and i find this argument difficult but how do you know and you say tree rings.

they formed in the 50 years we've been thinking about these okay maybe that you don't know how long it took for the others. >> we do. >> how would i prepare for the debates? because of the electric internet as the kids use to the national center for science education heard about this or found out about it and they contacted me and this other guy josh rosen who was a thoughtful guy we got talking on the phone and i decided this is a major league so i flew to berkeley to their office and we spent all saturday afternoon, i bought lunch and we went over decent arguments and i have to tell you it was fun.

i estimated, i read the book is, my old books and i looked at modern stuff online and i estimated that there are at least 16 million species today but it's probably 80 million. and of course how does it go whatever the deity is involved and he's especially fond of the beatles as there are 350,000 at least and that was 34 years ago, so then i said well this is arithmetic if there were 16 million species now and you have had 4,000 years that means we need 11 new species in a not 11 new plants but the species.

these 680,000 players and have the winter snow cycles every year. the key is the national center for science education education is the legend about and they pointed out the arc and the extraordinary claims about that. and i had never really made much about the wyoming, which was a wooden ship built in the 19 hundreds but sank. it was some fantastic material but when you have a ship but the football field long but it is a lesson to be learned if the most

skilled shipbuilders couldn't, could eight family members with no tools pull it off. so that's the kind of fundamental critical thinking basic straightforward science and math ideas. >> at the start of the talk they threw up a slide where he said some scientists say we shouldn't be debating these guys and the question is a lot of scientists feel that way. it's a waste of time. is it a mistake or are they right to ignore it? >> as we like to say you may be right. when i get letters from people that are strident about something, you may be right. that's how i started, but you may be wrong. sorry. there is a deep concern that by

debating these guys you will look back. as a science educator he will look bad and that's a risk. my understanding is that in the past, for you students in the 1980s were notorious for this. they call it the gallup and then the scientists were left to refute this idea so what i brought to the party was i spent about of time on television and sometimes as an actor what will really go badly is if you lose your cool, if you forget yourself. then the other thing that i disagreed on with my colleagues is you want to go second. they all want you to go first. now, and because apparently he would go first and throw the scientist into a tailspin to

debunk all of these issues but this other guy brought up but i said no you want to go second and what is fundamental is the audience for that talk, that debate wasn't there in the room. and i say to everyone i want to go to the lions den and into the theater where it is the most comfortable. thank you for your support. just to tell you so far the answers in genesis may have crossed a big line. their job application requires you to testify to your christian faith which by the way isn't all

old testament. [laughter] >> i'm just a science correspondent to help discuss biblical matters. the other thing, you can't be. that is on-the-job applications. apparently you can do that if you are hobby lobby or whatever but not if you're going to take tax dollars so one of the big thing is they bring tourists to the commonwealth of kentucky and they feel that they are entitled to certain tax breaks so they may have crossed a line and they are not backing down from that so we will see how that goes. but i feel doing that debate raised everyone's awareness area i'm not sure that we would have filled the theater with this

awareness of creationism versus critical thinking and the future and climate change without that. >> how many people watched it apostolate i love you guys. for the rest of you but was just two and a half in critical hours. >> i was staying in bed until 9:00 that's late enough for me. i would wake up and say what are you doing and they were watching an interesting debate on the internets to sitting in edinburgh scotland. >> the internet, we didn't use to have it. >> you just talked to each other. we had conversation. >> what? laughter come >> is there a place where the scientific discourse breaks

down? i'm thinking about his sometimes they try to answer questions they don't have an answer for. >> i've never done that. >> there's a good reason the stem cell research is important and we are not really telling them when we do ask that you don't have to worry about it and some people didn't buy that argument. do you know what i'm talking about? >> embryonic stem cells, the extraordinary claim, and i guess i'm changing the subject, changing the question a little. the extraordinary claim is that life begins at fertilization and that's an extraordinary claim because most eggs that are fertilized kind their way to the ecosystem by any means. they become part of, not to put

it to a fine point that they become sewage and so it isn't clear should we be arresting every woman that has a fertilized egg doesn't implant in the womb and what about the guys, all that sperm and you blew it -- [laughter] you're all under arrest. "if you could clone somebody from a cell, any time you shave your killing cells which is potentially -- i could go all the way. but i still think the serious point here if it isn't a conception when is it? you have to guess. >> i did earlier. >> no, you are a guy.

[laughter] >> he made reference to your son. >> i must be thinking of something else. >> i did mention that as troubling as it is, your parents did have sex at least once. [laughter] >> possibly with each other. [laughter] >> i will get this over quick. does anybody remember -- for those of you that are too young she was notorious for having had sex on the u.s. capitol steps. the crazy thing was a guy was her husband. that's just why old. [laughter] >> so, about this win is a

person a person that is a great question. so, if it is implanted in the uterine wall and it becomes 16 cells, 150 cells, then where are we. but if they are undifferentiated, then there is an argument that they are not a person yet. okay. all right. but the problem arose years ago -- you remember dolly the sheep. she's the first cloned. i didn't make this up. they used a mammary cell because i guess from a microscopic point of view they are big. they are in a large diameter. and so, because of dolly parton, they called it dolly the sheep. i'm not making that up. don't be shooting the messenger.

but anyway, they did. mechanically, they still do take these extraordinary fine pets and coax them into the cell and replaced the dna with something else. and the offspring are still frolicking in the scottish hills. her genes have passed into the future. so, people were wondering can you take stem cells and do whatever you want and i just have to ask everybody, you know, we have all this -- we spend enormous resources on artificial hip and knees and people get injured in battle and car wrecks. would it be unethical to reduce the body to grow their own hips and knees and so on come is there a way to do it and i would remind us all that fertilized

eggs, human eggs are thrown away all the time, discarded or processed. so there is an ethical question and i just really want us all to think about it. my big deal i will insist a fertilized egg is not a person. it is integrate to vote. it's just scientifically, mechanically, by a medically committed under the microscope, and it's not a person yet. it's not clear we should be passing the law based on that sad presumption. and nobody would even know about all this without microscopes and science. that's the irony. >> it's just to these areas where science can only take you so far and you get into a moral question. >> it's the case of those that it can show you a lot of people have had it wrong so far when

you look more closely you literally discover something. >> so i was interested in your book you were talking about genetically modified organisms and whether those were bad or good, different, like them, don't like them there's been a lot of promise from companies that say we are going to feed the world by creating the crops resistant to pesticides were we are going to add the genes that will give more vitamins -- >> it was supposed to provide vitamin a to african kids so they wouldn't have these ideas he is. >> so this is good? >> the potential is great and we tried it with some success but there has been mixed reviews. i don't know if you are into genetics -- i called the chapter what the gmf, genetically modified food which is a macro and you don't hear very much for

genetically modified organisms. so, our story begins with c. george washington who bred wheat. he would use a magnifying glass and shake one to another and he did with some success. he was an agriculturalist with the resources. so that makes perfect sense because it seems like it could have been in the nature of the wind conditions were right. but then as you may know, people are able to -- we had a problem in the u.s. with a european corn border. so these people found a way to take the genes from a virus or this bacterium that lives in the soil below the corn plants and put it in the corn and then it

crystallizes and ties. so that seemed like a great thing. is that good or bad? everybody here has eaten it. i've been eating it for years and i'm fine. i think. so then as you know they got the genetic modifiers and they are able to make corn and soybeans that are in this pesticide roundup that is a big brand and it kills everything that's not the corn and soybean plants that have been modified. so also if you don't know the story, if you are a monarch butterfly, poland is the best. it's the best. and so i accidentally it was not

to the extent of a panic not that big an effect. but just what if it had been a huge thing. we all have enough food in the world to feed everybody we cannot just distribute it. we have a problem in the united states that we have malnourished people and so it is a mistake. it's not managing things properly. and so this has economic costs. and so my big thing. it's anything that you planned or modify. but you can't know exactly what

is going to happen in the ecosystem. you can do pretty well but nobody saw it in the other dice field did he steal it, can you patent the genes, so there is just a lot of controversy because of these areas. and i just for the sake of the ecosystem i want to go slowly on that. especially it comes to using tax dollars to fund the research. the golden rice seemed like a cool idea but it hasn't changed the world or revolutionized life in africa the way people once thought that it might. but the clean water if we had a way to get the clean water it in and genuine challenge. it is an engineering challenge. it's a management problem and it's a political problem and international relations problem. and in the venture capital with everything. if you can get clean water,

engineers, chemists if you can find a way to come you could get rich. you brought up george washington just now and i think i would like to ask the question a lot of people are wondering. are you running for president? [applause] >> it is sobering to think every other person that you meet voted for the other guy or gal. i had no plans to run for president. do you know how complicated it is to be president? every day this stuff is coming at you. now we have another war in syria. by the way, very reasonable that the conflict or the arab spring

was a result of climate change. it was a drought in the middle east and people migrated into there was issues and conflict and we kind of sweep that under the political ground. there is a drought in california and that is a displaced developed world. >> you mean california. [laughter] spinnakers cash machines. >> here is a question -- we have a lot of them and i'm sorry we won't get to all of them but what do you like about the extinction or trying to genetically re-create the species? >> i think that it would be cool in moderation. the one that i would like to bring back and you can all guess it, stellar sea cow we in 1870 something the captain wrote in his book i think we got

the last one today. so this was a marine mammal attend to the floridian vanity, but a salt water animal lived in the bering sea largely independent of the because of its aspect ratio that was the result which was the result of the myth about mermaids so that i would love to see. i would love to get a dodo bird back. that was thoughtless. and i mentioned these two because they are recent. i got a feeling that if we brought them back to the public might be technically possible to bring them back and then the other thing i think the ecosystem could tolerate it reintroducing the species. but come on. if you had a toronto source that would just be cool. so anybody if you are going to remake jurassic park, don't use and indians you want to use a

bird dna to start with and then everybody's going to have feathers. all the dinosaurs are going to have feathers as a recent discovery. >> excellent. this is from jimmy age 11. >> i was in london for a while. [laughter] >> for how long? >> when and how did you get into science and get anybody inspire you? >> everybody inspired me. first, i grew up in the city and i told this story often. just remember, staring at ease, bumblebees come and i remembered us watching and watching and i sat there to the point that i was convinced i was seeing the same come and go and they were all girls by the way. once in a while you will see a

boy. they have tiny wings. how can you do that, how can you stuff pollen in the pollen baskets and fly around and then it kicked in. my older brother with the above are the "washington post". i later became a paperboy that this was before but this was before i was big enough to carry stuff. in ripley's believe it or not they decide instead according to theory the bumblebee cannot fly. i run member thinking i wouldn't have expressed it in this way but are you high? [laughter] they are flying. and even then, i realized not everything growing up they tell you is going to be right. then i got stung by the end that was a drag.

so my mom put ammonia on it and it felt better. the assets neutralized and we donated accepting the proton and that is a little bit that we are doing their. and then my brother had a lion of gilbert chemistry set back when they were dangerous and cooled. and he made ammonia in my hand and i just went through something -- i have to know what's going on. and so i will just tell you in the back of the book coupon for your self i know that you all by this. but i have a list in the acknowledgments of my older brother, all the teachers that were just a huge influence on me. [applause] you spend more time with

teachers and you do with than you do with your parents most of the school year. and so we needed people to teach. i know that it's easy to say that i'm not getting. so, joseph, was that his name? >> did you look over here this is from joseph. >> he asked -- >> he asked a question. >> i am really fortunate. this is from joseph who says with the flooding of information from the internet what is the best way for the society to articulate or to discriminate factual information from false because that's one of the problems, they look the same. >> you could of course call me. >> did you want to give your number quite >> no, i'm good. [laughter] here's the thing. back in my day when i was your age, going to the library --

[laughter] and look things up. and you would look things up in the world book which is an excellent source by the way. and the encyclopedia britannica. and the information in those books was in general very good and very accurate. if you looked for abraham lincoln's birthday it would be in there and it would be right. now if you look it up, you are going to find the stuff when he was a vampire and reincarnated, so this scale we need now is not just to look things up. that's the good old days. no come in the better days you have to have the skill to sort through that i guarantee having millions of years of sources of information coming in will will get more and better and accurate

answers to anything thai could have done in my lifetime. so the skill that we need now is sorting through. you have to develop it as a critical thinker and scientific person can develop the skills to sift through that where in my day we had to develop the skills to find it in the first place that's changed. i will give you another example my grandfather was an organic chemist and he could blow his own class. it was something they had to learn how to do. while they don't do that now. my nephew is a chemical engineer there's a software that does it for you and you don't have to do calculations. then also into engineering with a slide rule.

it's cool, it's fun. but have you ever seen the vanguard rocket car that old footage those were slight rules. these two have races. that's how we were but it's not a skill you need. now we need to be able to sift information quickly. >> what is something that has amazed you today? >> as opposed to yesterday? >> she was unclear about whether she meant today it just says today. >> here's what freaks me out every day pretty much is that we can think and i'm not kidding. we are a -- you probably sat through this a few times we are made through the dust of

exploded stars and it has gravity even though it's just fast and it all came together and we have a son and we are on this planet and we have some other planets and asteroids which was cool. we are made of this material, that stardust. you and i are at least one way that the universe knows itself. that's astonishing so there's a responsibility. does the universe expect something of me, can i leave it better than i found it or am i nothing, nobody, as back? i don't know but it is good to me every day. that everyday. that is a good question. >> along those lines with

scientific accomplishment do you hope to see in your lifetime? >> a better battery. [laughter] no, i'm not talking about just for my phone, i mean rick large. if we had an excellent way to store electricity it would change the world. suppose that under this building were enormous facts of something that would be batteries and so the sun shines all day 80% efficient we would have wind turbines on the mountain or something and there's five times as much wind energy in north dakota as we need in north america if we could just get it from there to here in the storage overnight. it would change the world. i would love to see that.

what else do we need? >> go to mars. >> would we want to do box [laughter] >> i know that we are all evan osnos of the motto in california eureka, i found. these european guys come over the hill over the sierra nevada mountains in and the orange trees are like weeds into this protein just swims into your lap and they find that the rocks are made of gold. if you go to mars it's not like

that. [laughter] [applause] i'm telling you you open the door of the spaceship and you can't even breathe. and unless you are at the e. crater on a summer day, it's 20 below celsius at least. it's 20 below here, 40 below here and colder than that appeared the atmosphere is so send. if you think you can set up camp and live off the land with your fusion reactor, just go to antarctica. [laughter] none of this shoreline where the pendulums are jumping around no.

it hasn't snowed and rained in over a century and to play along takeover of the tanks that you need for say two years and think if it is really for you. and i will just say again to everybody if i'm the ceo of the planetary society now, organization started by carl -- [applause] just to jot the name -- [laughter] i had him when i was in college, just clerical error on their part. i wasn't his best student or anything. i joined the planetary in 1980 when disco was getting way to the new wave.

i had been a member all the time and then something happened. mr. levin is on the board and is one of the inventors of xm radio and we advocate for planetary science -- i left the room and came back and i was the ceo. we advocate for the planetary explanation because if i can use the term it is only $1.5 billion a year so it is a line item within the line item. if we were to find evidence of life on mars or stranger still something still alive on mars or we could fly through these plumes of jupiter that's at the

seawater for 4.5 billion years maybe there's something alive in there is something alive in the ocean water that would change the world. it went in to be done by one person like galileo and copernicus or something. it would be done by all of us. that's perfect. i was going to say we are done. let me tell you this part of the entertainment is finished. those are great answers. thank you for the questions. we are going to let bill go offstage and i do whatever he does for five minutes while they reset the stage and then he will sign every book personally. i figure what are their 2,000 people, how fast can you sign back it might take a while.

[laughter] >> that's what they told me. >> did we get through all the questions? cool. thank you for all the questions. >> here. i have lots of questions. we could stay at home light that i was told we have to get off at a:15 and it says it is a:15. >> and older reference to most of the older listeners. >> i'm not talking to them, i am talking to you. >> so if captain cook had your watch, he could have gone everywhere without all that drama. >> it wouldn't have been so great because it kinds itself to the clock in colorado that sends out a signal and it wasn't working then. we have to go to. thank you. >> thank you all so much. [applause]

>> you're an engineer, aren't you? carry on. see you in a few minutes. thank you, thank you. ..