FTFY
3 Likes
Nah, he just couldn’t deal with Carlson.
Carlson’s whole schtick is to bring on people who disagree with them and then laugh/giggle/interrupt/etc to throw them off and try to make them look incompetent. He interjects with mild insults and then changes topics rapidly to keep them from being able to answer. He literally does this EVERY time.
Bill is just older. A slightly younger Bill Nye might have been quick enough to talk over him. His planned approach seemed to be to speak slowly and clearly and make Carlson look like an absolute asshole. It didn’t work as well as he had hoped.
Carlson’s technique is a surprisingly effective tactic if the viewer has any sympathy for Carlson’s position. Viewers will generally think that Carlson was successful in “defeating that damn liberal”. He honed the technique on "Crossfire"
It is an aggravating technique, though. It basically strips the entire conversation of any substance. This is why Jon Stewart went on “Crossfire” and berated him, in one of Stewart’s most viral moments.
Carlson is only effective if he has someone “debating” him. This is why his entire show is interviews. He isn’t persuasive as a speaker at all. Other conservative talk radio personalities can at least be persuasive to their followers when talking from the pulpit, but Carlson is basically just a one-trick pony. He can run around in circles during an argument.
2 Likes
Ahh. I should go for more walks.
Tucker Carlson is still a waste of space though.
If science-minded folks want to be great communicators to this audience, they are going to have to learn how disingenuous operatives like Tucker work, and then be good enough to beat them at their own game.
Start with the question: why does anyone watch Tucker Carlson? What is his audience tuning in to see, week after week? I don’t mean on a practical level, I mean, like, on an emotional level. Why is he worth their time? What are they getting out of him?
Were I to hazard a hypothesis, I might say that a lot of people watch Tucker Carlson to feel good about being Conservative. If you’re a science communicator invited on that show, you fit a narrative to that audience - that you are some bigwig elitist, that you threaten their way of life, that you are part of a conspiracy to ruin america, etc., etc.
Know that the moment you appear on the screen, this is the role that the audience expects you to play.
So if you want to go on Tucker’s show and talk about anthropogenic climate change, you have to play a different role - and give the people what they want.
So when Tucker asks for you to provide impossibly specific details (so that he can catch you when you don’t off-the-cuff know them), the counter can be something along the lines of, “Tucker, you know that in the Bible, God gave Adam stewardship of the land and all its beasts. You know that it is the sins of mankind that caused the Great Flood. How do I know that human beings can control the climate? For the Bible tells me so, Tucker. Who are you to question the Word of God?”
This isn’t an argument actually available to Bill Nye the Science Guy for a variety of reasons (chief among them being that it is mythological woo-woo), but it’d fuckin’ work, at least a little bit. Some people might see climate change in a different light, if someone phrased it as a religious responsibility that the Bible tells you can happen.
A softer parry might be something along the lines of, “You can find out for yourself at -insert climate change website here-. I think your audience is smart enough to read the information itself and make up its own mind without some scientific elitist telling 'em what to think.” You call 'em smart, give them something to spend some time raging against, and give the most honest answer possible to that impossible question. He could still spin it as a “so you refuse to answer,” but it’s a weak spin, since you basically said his audience was smart enough that you didn’t need to give them the answer.
The truth is that a lot of the audience isn’t that smart, but your goal here is to not be the enemy, and via that tribal witchcraft, some people might be more OK with admitting climate change is real.
Give the people what they want. If they want to feel good about being Conservative douchenozzles, make it easy for them to feel good about being Conservative douchenozzles while endorsing anthropocentric climate change. Being a Conservative douchenozzle is more important to these people than scientific consensus.
9 Likes
Has anyone ever tried to rope-a-dope him? Basically let him run his mouth and look stupid, and then calmly defeat all his windbaggery once he runs out of steam?
That’s what hair and makeup people are for.
1 Like
I guarantee you Carlson and his viewers would have said, “1.5 degrees colder or warmer? That doesn’t sound like anything to be alarmed about. Who cares?”
1 Like
God that was hard to watch. Carslon was really rude. He had no interest in learning anything; he just wanted to create entertaining television.
3 Likes
Nye: Why are people climate change skeptics?
Carlson: I thought you scientists loved skepticism.
Nye: Yes, of course, but this is settled. Being skeptical about settled, established facts is silly.
Carlson: How can it be settled if I don’t believe it?
7 Likes
I haven’t watched this admittedly, but I’ve always thought that a simple question to a climate change denier is whether he has house insurance, or believes in spending on the military because it all depends on the small chance of certain events happening. Even looking at history - we know that the calamity of the dust bowl in the 30s was something purely man-made (caused by farming in an area that was didn’t have sufficient rain and removing the perennial buffalo grass which retained water, tractor farming etc which coincided with historic droughts)
I honestly think that the real argument to use is one of economics and technological competition. Forget Paris and COP21, we are already half way to 2 degree warming. 200 nations won’t come up with an agreement without cheating. The issue that should matter is the technology, cars will go electric, solar and wind are going keep improving while fossil fuels will keep getting more expensive (look at coal a 10% drop in price led to a decline of the whole industry- Peabody is in bankrupty, coal is not coming back. For that matter an increased emphasis on fossil is going to increase the supply and result in lower prices again - which is not good news for the US fracking industry which is billions in debt.
When battery technology gets developed to where it is competitive, it will probably be in Germany, and that along with China will leave the US behind. So essentially arguing against climate change is arguing against competitive development of renewables and letting other countries take the lead.
They did for ozone depletion.
1 Like
I think so. But the people who care about pieces of paper (I don’t) will say he’s a mechanical engineer, not a chemist or physicist or even a biologist*, and because he has “only” a Bachelors, he would barely be qualified to be a bottle washer in a research lab, let alone a research scientist in his own right. Lots of room for those goalposts to be moved to. However, Bill Nye’s background stands for itself, and does not need extremely expensive toilet paper to back it up. Also, when you want to explain a scientific concept that just about every legitimate climate scientist agrees is happening to the common person, you don’t want a random academic**, you want a science educator, and there are few if any better than Bill Nye.
*these people tend to really not like biologists.
**I have known some charismatic and articulate professors and researchers in the physical sciences, but they are unfortunately in the minority
You’re telling me this? I already know. I am an engineer but have published fairly regularly as well, and cross back and forth over the science/engineering line all the time. I’m not as heavily focused on experimental design as my scientist colleagues though. They eat sleep live and breathe the stuff, and for me it’s just something I can do. I have not worked with any engineers who I would consider scientifically illiterate,* but I would trust any of them more than the average person on any scientific matter, and infinitely more than some slimebag with an ulterior motive.
*unless you include software engineers, then I’d say only some, and only in comparison to physical scientists
2 Likes
Winner winner…
1 Like
I would talk about the sea rise.
Anyone out there in St. Petersburg? Jersey City? Boston/Cambridge/Somerville MA? Better get used to living on a raft.
2 Likes
Skepticism is not denial. Skepticism is holding out on definite conclusions until all the facts are in. Denial is rejecting definite conclusions whether or not the facts are in.
6 Likes
Like I’ve said here a score of times, make a rock solid case that moving to renewables is going to reduce Joe and Jane’s cost of living - and I mean really reduce it, give them more takehome pay to spend on other stuff, not just reduce it by comparison to some calculated “externalities” number…
…and you are there, absolutely there, politically speaking.
Cucker Tarlson
2 Likes
What’s the word for that? Oh, yes: Backpfeifengesicht.
Or is it Buickpfeifengesicht?
3 Likes
Of course they will. They don’t have a plan in place for dealing with science, or facts, or real-world change. January hurricanes they have a plan for: pray to Jeebus.
