On any given day, you can turn on the Science channel and hear NASA scientists talk about all the possible ways the Earth may get destroyed: From Coronal Mass Ejections to gamma ray bursts to wandering black holes to our planet’s core eventually stopping. But when it comes to global warming, it’s a sacrosanct subject. At least on Facebook, where the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) this week pounced on users who even hinted that global warming wasn’t catastrophic, occurring, or occurring at a much slower rate.
And it wasn’t even NASA’s Facebook page being defended, but rather Bill Nye the ‘science guy’s,’ who recently entertained the idea of jailing climate skeptics for “affecting my quality of life.” Marc Morano, the reporter and filmmaker behind the upcoming documentary Climate Hustle, interviewed Bill Nye and confronted him on certain statements made by climate activists, such as “jailing skeptics as war criminals.” Nye responded: “For me as a taxpayer and voter — the introduction of this extreme doubt about climate change is affecting my quality of life as a public citizen.”
To highlight to everyone that Nye tried to make a wager with Morano that was rejected, Nye posted a link on his Facebook page to the article. In the article, it accused Morano of not putting his money where his mouth is by refusing the bet, but after Examiner contacted Morano, he said it had nothing to do with what the article, or Nye, insinuated.
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Morano, who also runs Climate Depot, said in an emailed statement that “Nye’s temperature bet is pointless on many levels. First off, given the geologic history of the Earth, how does one year here or there or even a decade prove anything? Second, Nye is implying that ‘record’ temperatures that are not outside the margin of error of the dataset are somehow meaningful. Even former NASA climatologist James Hansen admitted “hottest year” declarations are “not particularly important.”
Internet users flocked to Nye’s Facebook post and left an “onslaught” of comments casting doubt on official figures released by NASA over the years. Over 800 comments were listed as of press time under Nye’s original post (see photo), many expressing doubt over NASA’s ability to remain impartial when it comes to global warming theory. Users wrote of their utter disdain for NASA and its continuing practice of trying to hide the hiatus by jiggering its own data.
NASA also used the specious “appeal to authority” argument when responding to Facebook users, though many of them were having none of it. One user wrote under Nye’s post, “Right. Despite NASA confirming that fossil fuels are actually cooling the planet’s temperature, and that there’s more ice than in the last century on the polar ice caps. And the fact that the so-called rises of the sea levels have not materialized…”
NASA, for whatever reason, immediately jumped in and replied, “Do not misrepresent NASA. Fossil fuels are not cooling the planet.” NASA went on to quote research, and used the infamous hockey stick graph that has been debunked by many esteemed climatologists. It brought out all the usual props and climate change shibboleths to show that global warming is occurring. More disturbing was that it wasn’t even their Facebook page, but rather Bill Nye’s, who has a B.S. in mechanical engineering, and not climatology or meteorology.
What NASA can’t explain away is the global warming hiatus since 2000 that even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a bureaucratic branch of the U.N. created to prove global warming is occurring, acknowledged the pause in its last assessment report. NASA even rewrote its own historical data to make the hiatus disappear. The most recent study done regarding the “pause in rising temperatures” showed there has been a global warming slowdown from 2000-2014.
Another user commented: “When 16 state attorney generals are forming a committee on how to prosecute ‘deniers’ I probably wouldn’t take that bet either.” Another wrote, “When NOAA literally changed decades of temperatures how can you make a bet? Heads I win, tails you lose. Bill Nye has debated Morano on other outlets and [Nye] has always looked silly, unprepared, and without facts.”
