Bill Nye the Science Guy makes appearance at UNT, calls for change

by Kara Fordyce of North Texas Daily

Famed television scientist Bill Nye electrified the Auditorium Building at UNT last night as he challenged an estimated 1,500 people to change the world.

He entered from behind the stage's green curtain, decked out in a full tuxedo, to a sea of students and faculty giving him a standing ovation and snapping flash photos.

Nye, who became famous from his PBS program,

"Bill Nye the Science Guy," lectured as part of the Distinguished Lecture series. Hope Garcia, student life director of the student development department, said the event was originally planned on being in the Gateway Ballroom, but after 600 tickets were sold out in four hours last semester, the event was moved to the Auditorium Building to hold an additional 900 people.

"We never expected to have this much excitement from our community in having Bill Nye as our guest," Garcia said. "But after the loads of disappointed students and members of the outside community turned up ticketless, we soon realized what a thrill this event had stirred."

Using a PowerPoint presentation, Nye started with a picture of the Earth from space. Throughout the evening, he used a combination of his own personal photographs along with images he had gathered to emphasize his main points. He started by naming the Space Generation, those born after Oct. 4, 1957.

"The things you are going to live through will be as equally astonishing as my grandmother, who saw the Wright Brothers' first flight," he said.

Nye used comparisons of temperatures, air conditions and surfaces from other planets, proving the joy of discovery. He illustrated such principles by using the sundial as an example, which his father studied intensely while spending four years in a prison camp during World War II. This led to comparing Mars' shadow to Earth's, one planet's being an orange color while the other has a light blue shadow.

Nye also introduced the Climate Generation, those born after June 23, 1988. He said even to this day, we meet people who are skeptical of climate change.

He compared conditions of transportation between three places: Beijing, India and Los Angeles. By reiterating that more energy is used in driving than manufacturing in North America, he said that if every vehicle in the world got four times more miles to the gallon, this could be changed.

"Here's what I want you to do: I want you to change the world," Bill Nye said. "If one of you could develop a better battery, you could become rich."

The main theme, "change the world," was repeated throughout his lecture and was connected to using pig waste instead of factories for nitrogen production, using the highest known efficiency vehicle, the bicycle, and reducing gas and electric bills by using more solar-powered energy sources. He said it's about doing more by using less.

"If we can go from riding horses to driving trucks without the luxury of iPods, anything, my friends, is possible," he said.

Toward the end of his lecture, he said there is a small inscription on the Mars sundial: "To those who visit here, we wish a safe journey and the joy of discovery." Nye said this is the essence of science.

Nye told the story about when he was in third grade and his teacher told them that there are more stars in the sky than grains of sand on the beach. This meant that basically every person is a speck that lives on a speck, which we call Earth, which made him begin to feel pretty insignificant.

"I am just a speck on a speck in the midst of speckles," he said. "But with our big brains, we can change the world. I want you, North Texas, to change the world."

At the end of his lecture, the audience gave him a standing ovation, which was followed by a question and answer session. The questions students had during the session spanned from Bill's favorite type of music (swing), politics, evolution, UFOs and Pluto.

Shannon Galligan, a kinesiology freshman, said she heard about the event from her friend's resident assistant at Kerr Hall. Both girls said they watched Nye's show when they were little.

"The lecture was enlightening and educational," Galligan said. "It brought back my childhood memories. Now I am going to, dare I say it, change the world."