Bill Nye, scientist and TV presenter: “Everyone you’ll ever meet knows something you don’t. Everyone”

Bill Nye “The Science Guy” became a beloved educator through his quirky and witty television program teaching people the wonders of science in a way that everyone could grasp. He himself learned from one of the best during his mechanical engineering undergraduate studies at Cornell University when he took an astronomy class taught by Carl Sagan.

The host of the original ‘Cosmos’ TV program recommended that Nye focus his own idea of an educational TV program for children on pure science. “Kids resonate with pure science,” Sagan told his former student. It was a hit, and over its five year run Bill Nye The Science Guy won 19 daytime Emmy awards and inspired a generation of youngsters to study STEM degrees.

Such has been his influence that he has frequently been asked to give commencement speeches at universities around the country. In 2019, he returned to Goucher College, the alma mater of his mother, for a second time. During his inspiring address he repeated a line of his that is often quoted: “Everyone you’ll ever meet knows something you don’t. Everyone.”

Learning from others to make the world a better place

The Science Guy told the Goucher graduates that if you could choose when to be born, “as strange as it may seem, this really is the best time.” This is because “the opportunities before us are amazing,” he said. Optimism is key to moving forward for “people who are not optimistic don’t get very much done. They get spun up and worn down by their own self-doubt, and they’ll bring you down with them.”

Today, we are blessed with the ability to discover new information in the matter of “a few milliseconds” thanks to the internet Nye reflected. However, we have to deal with the fact that “people do make up a lot of misleading and just plain wrong things and post them on the internet,” Nye pointed out.

But that just means we have to keep an old, tried and true skill sharp and ever present, critical thinking. “It’s what we used to call reasoning or logic, the ability to reason, whether or not something is reasonable, and then to find a way to check it, to verify it,” the scientist explained.

One thing that helps in that endeavor is taking into account the source of the information that you are receiving. “Farmers know things about plants that most of us, even botanists, never will” Nye noted. “Bricklayers have an intimate knowledge of what it takes to lay bricks. Cooks know how to use copper bowls to control egg proteins, and that’s cool.”

“Now here’s something else I hope you’ll carry with you as long as you live. Everyone you’ll ever meet knows something you don’t. Everyone,” he said. Nye urged his audience to “respect that knowledge and learn from others. It will bring out the best in them, and it will bring out the best in you.”

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