Valin Posted October 2, 2014 Share Posted October 2, 2014 Politico Magazine: RICH LOWRY October 01, 2014 Neil deGrasse Tyson is a very famous and popular scientist. He even has a TV show. And wears a cool astronomical vest. Only he’s not infallible. This rather basic truth has been established over the past couple weeks, over much resistance and at the cost of much abuse, by Sean Davis of the lively new conservative website, the Federalist. Davis dug into a handful of just-so stories repeated by Tyson in his public lectures, the point of which is to make himself — and by extension, his audience — feel superior to the dolts who aren’t nearly as scientific as he is. The controversy centered on an erroneous Bush quote that Tyson made a staple of his public presentations, and has come to settle on the head-scratching question: Why is it so hard for a scientist committed to evidence and rationality to admit that he got something wrong? You can see Tyson using the Bush quote in a talk at something called The Amazing Meeting, which describes itself as “the leading conference in the world focused on scientific skepticism.” This scientific skepticism is, judging from the reaction to Tyson, to be distinguished from skepticism about people who cloak themselves in science. When Tyson puts up a slide with George W. Bush’s name on it, the audience laughs, prepared to have its prejudices confirmed, and Tyson obliges with his bogus quote. Tyson says that right after Sept. 11, Bush asserted the superiority of “we” to “they” (i.e., Muslim fundamentalists) by saying, “Our God is the God who named the stars.” (Snip) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyber_Liberty Posted October 2, 2014 Share Posted October 2, 2014 So, the story of Tyson's self-puffery lying is starting to break out into the more mainstream publications? Kewl. I'm still stuck on the part where he called conservatives "squirrel eaters." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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