Bill Nye on NASA budget cuts & key space issues

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Time Markers

00:00 – Episode introduction00:18 – Guest introduction00:43 – Bill’s introduction to science03:50 – Space policy & proposed massive budget cuts05:45 – Commercial sector  and space science07:21 –  Settling Mars, it’s so hostile 10:45 – If we found life what does the mean?11:32 – Hypothesis – did life start on Mars?13:33 – Science communication & reaching people15:29 – Younger generation & STEM, is there an issue?19:31 – NASA needs an Administrator, now, support Isaacman21:45 – Space Takes – Deep dive on tariffs29:51 – Space Takes – Call for maintaining international collaboration33:17 – Space Takes – Budget cuts36:24 – Space Takes – Kuiper constellation 

Transcript – Bill Nye Conversation

David Ariosto – All right, Bill Nye , I can hardly think of a better known communicator of science, and I just I’m thrilled to have you on the show. Thanks. Thanks so much for joining us.

Bill Nye – Oh, it’s great to be here, as the saying goes, Yeah, my space news every morning. It’s the it’s, I won’t say I couldn’t live without it, but I’m very happy to have it.

David Ariosto – Well let’s get into that. So before we actually, before we get into sort of space in NASA and Planetary Society, I was hoping to kind of get a little bit into your own career and maybe kind of like, set the table a little bit for us. So like, from your your days at Boeing to sketch comedy to television to eventually, sort of being at the White House to accept the Presidential Medal of Freedom. So you’ve had this sort of long career, and I’m just sort of wondering it is, Had you planned it this way? This is the vision all along. Like, how did this manifest?

Bill Nye – It manifested. So first of all, I really like science from being a little kid, and since we’re talking about aerospace, I remember very well getting stung by a bee, which was traumatic. And then I grew up in the city of Washington, DC. You know, people from Michigan go like this. In Washington, we go like this. I grew up in the city, right in Washington, and I delivered the Washington Post. I was a paper boy back when we had used that expression. And in Ripley’s, believe it or not, it said it’s a story that a version of the story. They run from time to time. According to aerodynamic theory, bees cannot fly. And although I was a little kid without much life experience, I remember thinking, bees are flying like the problem’s got to be with your theory there, right? And so it led me to question things, to formulate hypotheses of my own, and so on. And it’s interesting to me to note that how bees fly wasn’t really figured out till just about 30 years ago. There’s, there’s some crazy complexity of these vortices, these whirlpools that they’re, yeah, they’re smaller wings go backwards through. It’s really amazing. And they turn all the way over. It’s really something. It’s funny.

David Ariosto – You mentioned that because I think, you know, you see a lot in sort of modern aerospace, and particularly sort of, like in drone markets, like there’s sort of a mimicking of nature.

Bill Nye – Well, that’s our dream, is to bio mimicry. If we can, anytime you can do that, you’re in great shape.

David Ariosto – Yeah. And like, with the advent of sort of things like nanotechnology and artificial intelligence, artificial intelligence, and, you know, even quantum power technologies are kind of coming to the forefront. It just, I don’t know, it just strikes me, we’re kind of at this. We’re kind of at this, like, this intersection now, in which, you know, people often talk about, like, the golden age of space, or aerospace being like the 1960s and I don’t know that’s that’s true anymore. It does…

Bill Nye – Well we at the Planetary Society, like to point out, this is the most exciting time in space exploration since the Apollo era. I mean over. I mean without a question, the number of rocket launches per week alone per year is higher than ever in history, and people are talking about going to these extraordinary destinations with these extraordinary instruments and making what we presume will be extraordinary discoveries. So it is the most exciting time.

David Ariosto – Let’s get into that then, because we’ve seen through this evolution now you’ve had a more of a commercial push, obviously, in recent years. But you also see sort of evolving space policy. And I’m like wondering what you The Planetary Society like just generally are sort of paying attention to when it comes to sort of a space policy shift in this new administration, relative to what maybe we saw in the previous four years, like what? What stands out? What are you paying attention to?

Bill Nye – Well, the big thing we’re paying attention to and the big thing we had our day, days of action. Last week, we were on Capitol Hill with 105 members from around the country and a couple, often people from Canada, come here to lobby, or rather, to advocate. Eight lobbies, a literal verb, a specialized verb. We advocate for planetary science, because this proposal to cut the Science Mission Directorate 50% by half, this is what NASA does, to cut it in half, right? Is that’s big. We don’t want that. I don’t think it’s in anyone’s best interest, and it illustrates sort of a fundamental lack of understanding of what goes on at NASA, NASA’s mission, and when you talk about commercial activity, talking about mostly low earth orbit, maybe entirely low earth orbit, with just a couple exceptions, systems or spacecraft going to the moon. And this is, in a sense, what you want as a taxpayer and voter, as a global citizen, is you want NASA to be doing the extraordinary, one of a kind thing, sending instruments to Mars, Europa, the moon of Jupiter, Titan, the moon of Saturn. This, you want to NASA to be doing that and just buy rockets from people who make rockets.

David Ariosto – Is that, is that where it ends? Because it, you know, I think, I mean, I, I’ve heard this line in terms of, like, the perspective, you know, commercials, sort of the in the immediate vicinity of the earth, and where the NASA does the big things. But then you see those like Elon Musk talking about, sort of the nature on Mars. You talk about, you see Peter bag talking about rocket labs, or partnerships with MIT in terms of looking at the atmospheres in Venus. And you just start to see the commercial sector pushing further and further and further into space. And I wonder, in the context of not only this administration, but to sort of the growth of the commercial sector, where that go between is especially when you have the ISS retiring, and you know, more commercial space stations in the works, like, do we? Is science for the sake of science? Maybe a potential victim in some of these things.

Bill Nye – Well, people are acting like it’s not worth doing, or worth doing it only half the commitment that we have done for decades. And at the planetary side, we were very skeptical of that idea. There’s no commercial case for exploring the atmosphere in Venus unless somebody is paying Rocket Lab, and who would what entity would pay Rocket Lab? It’d be space agencies. And so, of course, I’m open minded, but the reason you go looking at the surface of Mars traditionally has been to look for signs of life. Start with looking for signs of water, and then looking for signs of life. This idea of colonizing or settling Mars, I think, is not very well thought I think is not very well thought through. Nobody settles Antarctica. You don’t go there to build a school or library and so on, because it’s too hostile on Mars. Hostile is just doesn’t do it justice. It’s so it’s so unlivable for entities like you and me that I don’t think anybody’s quite taken that into account.

David Ariosto – You think? Do you think in terms of the progression of the technology, like unlivable now, relative to to what, you know, just this enormous acceleration that we’ve seen in sort of advances of, you know, human engineering and technology, and in the intersection of those technologies that we mentioned, that long term, that This, that might start to change the math a little bit. And then, you know, if we start talking about not just exploration, but truly sort of multi planetary human civilizations, is that pie in the sky to you, or is that are there? Is there a real meat on the bone? There we talk about this.

Bill Nye – For me, there’s this meatless bone. But the people disagree with me, and I will ask whoever it is, who’s going to pay for it. And you know the example, another example I like to give, I don’t if you’ve ever been to a middle school gym locker room, it’s not a place you want to be after a few weeks on account of the atmosphere. Well, when you live in this dome on this hostile planet where there’s no food or air or water or virtually no water, you this sweaty bacteria full environment will not be especially appealing, and the example I give again is Antarctica. Yes, people go there to do scientific research, to learn about ocean currents, to learn about ecosystems in this extraordinary environment, to fact, you can even find fossil ancient dinosaurs. And sort of certain Arctic and Antarctic environments, but because the earth used to be fantastically much warmer, but that’s not you don’t go there to live, right? It’s just and you can when you’re in Antarctica or the Arctic, you can breathe, which is a big deal to most people. And so you can’t breathe on Mars, not like, let’s just set off nuclear weapons on the north pole of Mars, and it will, like a Star Trek movie, turn into this rich tropical jungle. That’s, I just don’t think that’s reasonable, yeah. And the other thing that you’ll hear all the time is, well, we have to take care of Earth First, and that’s true. But the other thing we are perfectly suited to living on Earth. We are not suited to living in space or on Mars without taking extraordinary steps. So I’m open minded you guys. But what I want, what I want is to find evidence of life on one of these other worlds, especially Mars, especially Europa. And so that’s why we at the planetary site advocate for missions to those destinations.

David Ariosto – If there was life, if there were life found in those in those places, because we’ve got this Mars sample return mission. We’ve got these upcoming Venus missions, Europa, there’s a lot in the works here, and we even talk about James Webb in terms of how that’s sort of scouring the universe. I want to kind of get into that specifically when we talk about sort of the the wonder of space, in a way, but philosophically, what? What would that do with with evidence of life elsewhere.

Bill Nye – I claim it would change the world. It would change the way everybody feels about being a living thing on earth. Everybody would feel differently about being alive. Everybody would wonder about consciousness, and everybody would wonder about any connection one might presume between life, discuss evidence of life discovered elsewhere and us, and the old hypothesis, which is just extraordinary but not can’t be dismissed out of hand, is that life started on Mars. Mars, smaller than the Earth, cooled off faster than the Earth got an ocean before the earth got an atmosphere before the Earth. Did life start on Mars, before Earth? And then did Mars get hit with an impact or and stuff got tossed into space and landed here on earth the way Mars rocks still do, even now. And you and I are descendants of Martians, right? Extraordinary hypothesis, right? And well worth investigating, and not really a footnote. Just to complete this thought, something of great concern to me, personally, as a guy of a certain age, I want to not contaminate the interesting landing sites on Planet Mars before we complete an investigation, an assay of what might be fossil Mars probes ancient Martian life and strangers still. You know, there’s places near the equator where apparently the very salty ice turns to slush. Are there places where Marc and microbes are still extant, still making a living. It’s an extraordinary hypothesis, and I don’t want to go there blasting rocks and dust and human bacteria gut biome all over the Martian landscape before we investigate the this hypothesis.

David Ariosto – But I want to ask you about that in terms of, like, not only sort of the generation or the germination of the planetary society itself, but you know, Carl Sagan and yourself. I mean, these are two. Two are sort of, sort of luminaries in the field of science communication. And I wonder, though I wonder, in the context of now about how people consume information and the technology of how to get these messages out, whether it’s it’s harder now, or maybe the appetite has changed a little bit in terms of, like, how, how do you reach people and like, where, where maybe, has science communication failed in some ways in terms of how we how we approach these things?

Bill Nye – Well, what we’ve done with everything is stratify society or divide society. So we have very scientifically literate people in one stratum and people who are not engaged in another. And if you don’t believe me, look at the this vaccine business. Yeah, not changing the subject. Some people accept the centuries old science of vaccines, and some people don’t. And it’s, of course, probably in that example, not in anybody’s best interest, but the debate about whether or not it’s worth spending or committing intellect and treasure, so called money and time to space exploration versus solving problems on Earth, that’s an old, old debate. And the answer is, you got to keep exploring. Or what does that say about you? And so when you say science communication, there are now more science outlets on the internet than ever than there ever were television shows. There are more books, paper books, being written now than are being published now than ever in history. So the answer is clearly without question. It depends.

David Ariosto – I guess. I guess when I, when I ask this question, I think about younger generations and how they think about, not only about space, but sort of STEM in general. And so if you look at STEM, I mean, this has been a, this has been an age old problem, but, but it’s, I think it’s starting to manifest and maybe come to a head now, in the sense that there’s a real question, Marc, in terms of investments in this country, the kind of enthusiasm that you might see for STEM and how that has sort of downstream effects in terms of those who are graduating certain PhDs in places like China and with relative to stem are almost doubling that of the United States. Now, it’s not like a totally one to one, because this us is still this sort of emporium of scientists from around the world. And so that ripple effect is not just in this country, but I wonder, like where it where it takes us long term in terms of that, like that long term strategic planning when we think about future generations.

Bill Nye – Well, I’m of an age. I’m a product of the Sputnik generation, Sputnik flu, 1957 and then the United States got all excited about science, engineering and math, and I am a product of that. I’m physics, physics, physics. That’s me. I can use a slide rule for crying out loud. And so one would presume that would happen again. But what’s going on right now, as I say, is the stratification of people who get advanced degrees, who pursue science technical careers and people who just don’t, and this is a great concern, and everybody understand the reason China has become a rival, the reason everybody’s running circle screaming is because they know the value of space exports. Operation taikonauts are national heroes. There’s a Chinese space station. There’s Chinese missions to the south pole of the moon, Chinese missions to Mars. They’re doing it because it brings out the best in people or in their in their industries. They solve problems that have never been solved before. It’s inspirational. And we make discoveries that change the way we feel about ourselves and our place in the cosmos, our place in space. They, they or a Chinese National Space Administration is involved in the same thing, the same for the same reasons that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration is it brings out the best in us. Solve problems that have never been solved before, and seek answers to the two deep questions, where did we come from, and are we alone in the universe? And if you want to answer those two questions, you’ve got to explore space. People in China understand it as well as anybody, but a difference is the Chinese government is centralized, and if it’s not a dictatorship, it’s certainly authoritarian. And people have argued that that’s not sustainable, and that sooner or later, it’ll all catch up with that government, and sure enough, there’s all these entrepreneurs and independent or entrepreneurial space systems In companies in China, space instrument and rocket companies existing as entrepreneurial entities and independent in China. So who know it’s going to be, as we say in sailboat racing, a near run thing? Who’s going to go around the buoy first? We’ll we’ll see. But for us at the Planetary Society cutting the NASA science budget by half is not in the national interest.

David Ariosto – Yeah, all right, I think that is a good place to leave it. Bill Nye…

Bill Nye – One more thing, thank you. But just now, NASA doesn’t have an administrator, right? And so this leads to, uh, money not being spent in an organized or thoughtful way, or people’s jobs being in limbo waiting for direction. The reason you have a manager is to manage things, and right now, NASA doesn’t have somebody in charge, and we have expressed support for Jared isaacman. He’s flown in space a couple times. He’s the real deal. I spoke with him briefly when I was at Blue Origin. We were all waiting for the new Glenn launch, getting to be around two in the morning, and I said, you know, what if we were to find life on another world? And he said, It would change the world. Would change the world. So although he’s an astronaut, though he’s flown in space, and is a big advocate of human space flight, he has an appreciation, near as I could tell, he has an appreciation for the discoveries to be made. And I presume the importance of getting organized and bringing the Mars samples back, rock samples back, continuing the human the habitable world’s observatory effort, getting the Nancy Grace Roman telescope, flying and coordinating with space agencies around the world to keep the Deep Space Network of telescopes running and maintain the United States as lead as the preeminent space agency. So you need a leader, and we’re hopeful that if not Mr. Isaacman, somebody gets gets appointed soon.

David Ariosto – I think that is a good place to leave it. Bill Nye, the Planetary Society, thanks so much for joining us. Is this is just, I have to tell this is just a real pleasure chatting with you.

Bill Nye – Oh, that’s great. Thank you so much. Carry on.