'Hey Bill Nye, Can I Have Superpowers?' #TuesdaysWithBill | Big Think

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This is the age of superheroes in the movie theaters. Captain America: Civil War made over 1.1 billion dollars internationally, and is the sixth highest grossing superhero film at the US box office to date. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice made over 870 million, even though it sits at a sad 27% on Rotten Tomatoes. Superheroes are our role models, and "The Ballad of Captain America's Disapproving Face" is nothing if not proof of their morals.

Bill Nye the Science Guy answers the main question that anyone who’s ever read or been to The Avengers has asked: can I be super? Sure, according to Bill Nye. But the powers that come with being super are negotiable.

Fan favorite Batman is a key example. He isn’t special, genetically speaking. To point out the obvious, Bruce Wayne is rather special – he has a Trump-load worth of money, and a mansion where he can hide his equipment. But other than that, he’s rather an Average Joe. He chose to be more. He trained hard to master what he could, built up his strength, and invented tools and weapons. Bruce Wayne’s utility belt is filled with items he uses with an expert’s hand to guard Gotham. Batman is a superhero, even if he can’t fly like Superman, or move objects with his mind like Jean Grey.

While Spiderman does have some super abilities, he made the web shooters himself (in most media). He’s a teenager who put his nose to the grindstone, and created something that helped him catch criminals in a humane manner – no one gets hurt by the webbing, but they are stopped. This is one of the main reasons Spiderman is so loved – he forged his own weaponry from scratch, something versatile that lets him glide right through Queens and tie up criminals without the ‘eye for an eye’ mentality that only perpetuates violence.

In both cases, they decided to be super. Yes, Peter Parker got bitten by a radioactive spider, which made him stronger, faster, and gave him the ‘spider sense’, but it was the webbing that made him a hero for a whole city. Spiderman built something that could help him get what he wanted done, and that made him super, just like Batman.

It is in these ways that someone can be a superhero. Similar to Peter Parker himself, Bill Nye says a person can try to cultivate something like spider sense, by learning to listen carefully to the environment around them. Perhaps they can train like Batman, learning to defend themselves better than they did before. And like Captain America, it can take a bit of thought to always find the high road to take. These are things we can all do to make ourselves a bit more super.

Bill Nye's most recent book is Unstoppable: Harnessing Science to Change the World.

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BILL NYE, THE SCIENCE GUY:

Bill Nye, scientist, engineer, comedian, author, and inventor, is a man with a mission: to help foster a scientifically literate society, to help people everywhere understand and appreciate the science that makes our world work. Making science entertaining and accessible is something Bill has been doing most of his life. In Seattle Nye began to combine his love of science with his flair for comedy, when he won the Steve Martin look-alike contest and developed dual careers as an engineer by day and a stand-up comic by night. Nye then quit his day engineering day job and made the transition to a night job as a comedy writer and performer on Seattle's home-grown ensemble comedy show “Almost Live." This is where “Bill Nye the Science Guy®" was born. The show appeared before Saturday Night Live and later on Comedy Central, originating at KING-TV, Seattle's NBC affiliate. While working on the Science Guy show, Nye won seven national Emmy Awards for writing, performing, and producing. The show won 18 Emmys in five years. In between creating the shows, he wrote five children's books about science, including his latest title, “Bill Nye's Great Big Book of Tiny Germs." Nye is the host of three currently-running television series. “The 100 Greatest Discoveries" airs on the Science Channel.

TRANSCRIPT:

Jordan: My name is Jordan and my question is: can I have superpowers? Thank you.

Bill Nye: Jordan, Jordan, Jordan. Can you have superpowers? You’re asking an excellent question. I think it depends what you mean. So for me as a guy of your age, I very much wanted to be able to fly like Superman. But I tried several experiments. I was completely unable to do so even if I put on a cape. And I look at your video, I see you’re wearing a super-guy outfit and you look super. But without a cape I don’t know how well that’s going to work......

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