What happened to the Bill Nye I grew up with?  :-o :-o This is a clip from his new show airing on Netflix:

 

NSFW. Seriously. Don't play this at work.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wllc5gSc-N8

 

 

He's promoting GMOs now.

 

"But in 2015, Nye suddenly changed his opinions on GMOs. He met with Monsanto representatives and somehow walked away a believer. He has now become a rabid devotee of GMO agriculture and wants to tell the world about it.

 

A couple of Nye quotes from a July, 2015 StarTalk Radio podcast:

 

"Compared to all the other herbicides, glyphosate's pretty benign, which I've done research on and I've decided that's true. I've changed my mind about genetically modified foods, that's the top line. ...

 

"The thing is, genetically modified food has no effect on us. That is to say, there is no difference between it and organically raised food. ..."

 

Aside from both of those statements being blatantly false, it's hard to believe these words are coming from the same person who made the above-quoted statements about responsible farming just two years prior."

 

 

http://www.naturalnews.com/053771_Bill_Nye_GMO_foods_industry_shill.html

There is nothing inherently wrong with GMOs. They become problems particularly when they develop things like RoundUp resistant crops, that this then doused in RoundUp to kill off pests, and poisoning the food we eat. These crops are cheaper to grow, and are very quickly taking over all of the production around the world. We are moving more and more towards monocultures that are owned by a single company. The farmers don't own the crops, and they have to buy the seeds from GMO crop providers like Monsanto.

 

Natural News is also a garbage site filled with conspiracy theories. As for Bill Nye, I think he's a pretty smart person, but definitely has let the spotlight get the better of him. I still generally agree with most of his positions.

In an interesting subplot to that strange episode of his new show, Netflix and Bill appear to have gone back and edited an episode of the old show to remove references to the fact that there are only two genders:

 

http://freebeacon.com/culture/netflix-edits-bill-nye-episode-remove-segment-chromosomes-determine-gender/

When uploaded to Netflix, an episode of the educational children's show "Bill Nye the Science Guy" cut out a segment saying that chromosomes determine one's gender.

 

In the original episode, titled "Probability," a young woman told viewers, "I'm a girl. Could have just as easily been a boy, though, because the probability of becoming a girl is always 1 in 2."

 

"See, inside each of our cells are these things called chromosomes, and they control whether we become a boy or a girl, " the young woman continued. "See, there are only two possibilities: XX, a girl, or XY, a boy."

 

But in the version of the episode uploaded to Netflix, the segment has been cut entirely. While noncontroversial at the time, the 1996 segment appears to contradict Netflix's new series "Bill Nye Saves the World."

 

Apparently you can bring up the versions of the show on Netflix and YouTube and see where they diverge. I haven't tried it to confirm. It's interesting, and if true, it reminds me of a quote:

 

"The past was alterable. The past never had been altered."

There is nothing inherently wrong with GMOs. They become problems particularly when they develop things like RoundUp resistant crops, that this then doused in RoundUp to kill off pests, and poisoning the food we eat. These crops are cheaper to grow, and are very quickly taking over all of the production around the world. We are moving more and more towards monocultures that are owned by a single company. The farmers don't own the crops, and they have to buy the seeds from GMO crop providers like Monsanto.

 

Natural News is also a garbage site filled with conspiracy theories. As for Bill Nye, I think he's a pretty smart person, but definitely has let the spotlight get the better of him. I still generally agree with most of his positions.

 

Spot on.  GMO's don't pose a risk to our health on their own, but they certainly change the economics of farming and increase the risk of mass crop failure.  The bananas that we buy at the grocery store have been wiped out once and might get wiped out again in the near future because of the practice of using a monoculture the world over.  If this were to happen to our grain or corn crop it could cause a global famine. 

 

All things considered I am pro-GMO because without them we probably wouldn't be able to feed the world and they allow us to increase yields while being more efficient with our resources (fuel, water, fertilizer, etc.).  We've been genetically modifying our crops for thousands of years anyway.  Just because we do it in a lab now instead of a field / greenhouse doesn't make it any more dangerous.

GMOs cut way down on pesticide usage.

 

Don't worry about the seeds being all the same with corn and soybeans any time soon. There's so many different seeds available that it will make your head spin. And new ones come out every season. You can't buy the same ones for more than 3-5 years now; they get discontinued too quickly.

It's interesting that in the 90's when his show aired, there didn't seem to be any distinction in the science or even social science world between Sex and Gender. When I entered the Urban Planning program at UC it was very clear to me through many, many social science classes that I was required to take, the difference between sex and gender and it honestly did made sense to me. This was '06-'08.

 

In his new Netflix series which I can't help but to believe is pandering to Millennials who grew up with his show and to hot topics of the day, he fails to explain this new phenomena, scientifically - which I'd expect from Bill Nye in his new show. This idea of a "Gender Spectrum" which he now, clearly promotes.

 

Before this absolutely ridiculous segment on his show which I provided a clip for, he said, 

 

"These are human chromosomes. They contain all the genes you need to make a human person. This one is called an X chromosome and this one down there, that’s a Y chromosome. They are sex chromosomes. Females usually have two Xs and males usually have an X and a Y. But it turns out, about 1 in every 400 pregnancies have a different number of sex chromosomes. Some people only have one sex chromosome, some people have 3, 4 or even 5. For me, I usually feel like I have a lot. But using science, we know that sex and every aspect of human sexuality, well, it’s a little complicated. "

 

This statement, followed by this ridiculous segment I provided a link for, makes me believe he's pandering to hot topic's of the day to make a buck on Netflix and is providing misguiding information and even conclusions.

 

"1 in 400"?! That doesn't seem as though it should warrant a "Spectrum."  I'd hope others would agree that 1 in 400 is pretty darn insignificant. I don't even like the use of the word 'spectrum.' When I think 'spectrum,' I think of autism and when you refer to 'sexuality' as a spectrum, it conjures up ideas of 'disease' or 'mental illness' and I don't feel that there's any need to look at sexuality like that.

 

I'm all for trans rights but I have a hard time coming to grips with there actually being 50+ genders and even feeling the need to refer to myself as "cis-gender" when such an extremely, EXTREMELY small fragment of the population doesn't actually identify as 'male' or 'female.'

naturalnews.com is the infowars of food journalism.

^ yeah and nye is the dr. phil of tv science. he has a bachelors degree and everyone thinks he is some kind of scientist.

 

both are fine as entertainment though, because someone has to bring us this information and real psychiatrists and scientists who are all about it are too busy to do that.

^Bill Nye is actually a scientist. Just look at his Wikipedia page. He has a pretty diverse collection of contributions to science and patents for inventions. You don't need a Ph.D to be a scientist.

ah, so i see. amateur scientist then. and also dr. phil's wiki asserts he did indeed get a phd after all.

He started his career as mechanical engineer. Today, he is just an entertainer. His past gives him a little more insight into some topics than most TV personalities, but having been an engineer at one point doesn't exactly qualify him as an expert on soft science fields like gender theory. He's just playing a part on screen, reading a script that was written to appeal to a specific demographic.

 

If you want to watch an actual show about science, watch something like "How It's Made."

^Bill Nye is actually a scientist. Just look at his Wikipedia page. He has a pretty diverse collection of contributions to science and patents for inventions. You don't need a Ph.D to be a scientist.

 

You don't even need a bachelor's degree.  Just ask Bill Gates, Steve Wozniak, Richard Branson, Larry Ellison, Michael Dell, and many other people you can't currently ask like Steve Jobs, Thomas Edison, Vladimir Nabokov, etc.

He started his career as mechanical engineer. Today, he is just an entertainer. His past gives him a little more insight into some topics than most TV personalities, but having been an engineer at one point doesn't exactly qualify him as an expert on soft science fields like gender theory. He's just playing a part on screen, reading a script that was written to appeal to a specific demographic.

 

If you want to watch an actual show about science, watch something like "How It's Made."

 

A few things.  Bill Nye is clearly a smart person and he has a particular skill set that allows him to explain complex technical theories in a manner that is easily understood by a lay person.  This argument about whether he is a true scientist or not is silly.  He was a successful engineer at Boeing for many years and has many patents to his name.  He clearly has credentials in science and engineering.  Just because he is now doing something else doesn't erase those credentials.  Just because Bill Gates isn't coding software anymore doesn't make him any less of an expert on computing.

 

"How it's Made" is a wonderful show.  One of my favorites in fact.  But I would not call it a show about science.  It is a show about manufacturing.  It doesn't get into the detailed design and only infrequently mentions why a feature exists, but it does explain the most basic elements of the manufacturing process.

Well, a Mechanical Engineering degree is nothing to sneeze at. He's been studying science his whole life, regardless of his formal education or job title. For some reason, a lot of Engineers are also entertainers, particularly stand-up comedians. That's nothing new. I would consider him qualified to speak on these issues but he does get a lot of contract engineering work. I know Toshiba is one company he works/has worked for.

 

Who knows, perhaps he's being given money directly or indirectly, to sway public opinion, on issues. I haven't looked much into it yet but I can tell you that for Millennials and people in my age group (I'm 30 - maybe I'm too old to be considered a Millennial) it's easy to be swayed by him. We grew up watching his shows in Science class. He was everyone's favorite Science teacher. He made it easy to understand, interesting and fun. I'm suggesting that it's potentially dangerous how political he is getting, going to great lengths to promote very specific, controversial agendas. I'm sure there's a lot of large corporations who understand the power of his influence on the younger generation. I've seen clips of his new show and it's nothing like what we grew up with. Frankly, it's somewhat disturbing.

It's extremely cliche to criticize generalist scientists AND generalist engineers. STEM worships the specialist and thinks ALL generalists should be selling used cars or flipping burgers.

^Bill Nye is actually a scientist. Just look at his Wikipedia page. He has a pretty diverse collection of contributions to science and patents for inventions. You don't need a Ph.D to be a scientist.

 

You don't even need a bachelor's degree.  Just ask Bill Gates, Steve Wozniak, Richard Branson, Larry Ellison, Michael Dell, and many other people you can't currently ask like Steve Jobs, Thomas Edison, Vladimir Nabokov, etc.

 

So in the new show somewhere (I think the episode about life on Mars) he actually explains he was an engineer either at nasa or working for nasa. I was like holy damn, I never new that! I don't see a problem if he wants to make money from at show, it's entertaining and informative, and I wish more people in science and engineering had that kind of platform to refute all the B's flying around the media.

It's interesting that in the 90's when his show aired, there didn't seem to be any distinction in the science or even social science world between Sex and Gender. When I entered the Urban Planning program at UC it was very clear to me through many, many social science classes that I was required to take, the difference between sex and gender and it honestly did made sense to me. This was '06-'08.

 

In his new Netflix series which I can't help but to believe is pandering to Millennials who grew up with his show and to hot topics of the day, he fails to explain this new phenomena, scientifically - which I'd expect from Bill Nye in his new show. This idea of a "Gender Spectrum" which he now, clearly promotes.

 

Before this absolutely ridiculous segment on his show which I provided a clip for, he said, 

 

"These are human chromosomes. They contain all the genes you need to make a human person. This one is called an X chromosome and this one down there, that’s a Y chromosome. They are sex chromosomes. Females usually have two Xs and males usually have an X and a Y. But it turns out, about 1 in every 400 pregnancies have a different number of sex chromosomes. Some people only have one sex chromosome, some people have 3, 4 or even 5. For me, I usually feel like I have a lot. But using science, we know that sex and every aspect of human sexuality, well, it’s a little complicated. "

 

This statement, followed by this ridiculous segment I provided a link for, makes me believe he's pandering to hot topic's of the day to make a buck on Netflix and is providing misguiding information and even conclusions.

 

"1 in 400"?! That doesn't seem as though it should warrant a "Spectrum."  I'd hope others would agree that 1 in 400 is pretty darn insignificant. I don't even like the use of the word 'spectrum.' When I think 'spectrum,' I think of autism and when you refer to 'sexuality' as a spectrum, it conjures up ideas of 'disease' or 'mental illness' and I don't feel that there's any need to look at sexuality like that.

 

I'm all for trans rights but I have a hard time coming to grips with there actually being 50+ genders and even feeling the need to refer to myself as "cis-gender" when such an extremely, EXTREMELY small fragment of the population doesn't actually identify as 'male' or 'female.'

So 1 in 400 multiplied by the world's population is 18.75 million people. I'd say that's significant.

I meant in terms of the idea of a 'gender spectrum' and all these SJWs inventing terms like 'cisgender' - which Bill Nye chose to use while pandering to his audience in this segment (and dozens if not hundreds of others) and expecting it to catch on. I'm all for GLBTQ rights and efforts to promote and protect those rights but that's a little ridiculous.

Lol, just getting after you. I have friends that are lbgtq and it can get a little over bearing sometimes with terms etc. Def support equality for all.

Bill is getting quite the backlash over this. It seems he has done the impossible by uniting liberals and conservatives in agreement; that the show is awful.

It really is horrible. I couldn't believe the clip I posted (in my original post.) It's blatantly clear that he's pandering and cashing in on the nostalgia of my generation for his show, while promoting certain political agendas for whatever reason. Everything about the show is bad, even down to the production quality. Sad, considering I can say with confidence that this has to have been a multi-million dollar project for Netflix. So much agenda and pandering with very little substance. It's unbelievable. Bill Nye The Science Guy was light years ahead in production and content quality 20 years ago, despite having a much lower budget.

To steal a quote from reddit, the intended audience for the show appears to be really edgy 12 year olds.

Nah; Bill is cashing in and pandering to millennials who grew up with his old show. For my generation, he was everyone's favorite Science teacher. I remember in 8th grade, when Mr. Schnur was too hungover to follow through with a lesson plan for the day, he would bring the TV in the room and pop in a Bill Nye The Science Guy VHS and it was like being on vacation from class It was very educational but also fun. Bill made science fun and interesting and he broke it down in a way that we could easily understand.