Bill Nye the Science Guy is a rock star at UD

Bill Nye the Science Guy got the rock star treatment Tuesday at the University of Delaware and no wonder. Most of the audience grew up learning about science from his television program.

And then he mentioned Rehoboth Beach and Funland and almost instantly became an honorary Delawarean.

But he turned serious when he talked about our nation's dependence on fossil fuels and his concerns for a warming planet.

"I want you guys to change all that," he said. "I want you guys to be part of a better future."

Nye was brought to the university by the Student Centers Programming Advisory Board. The format was a moderated discussion led by McKay Jenkins, the Tilghman Professor of English at the university. Jenkins focuses on environmental journalism.

He led Nye through a variety of hot button topics from genetically modified crops and the impact the may have on insects like the monarch butterfly, to space exploration, life on distant planets and the anti-science, anti-journalist push from the Trump administration.

"You can hate me," he said. And with that someone in the crowd shouted out: "We love you." "You can hate puppies ... But you do not want a country without a press."

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To the students in the room, Nye said he knew they were busy with college but he warned them: "Pay attention – it's an extraordinary time."

Nye said he was in college when Richard Nixon was president. And even though Nixon ended up resigning amid the Watergate investigation, he established the Environmental Protection Agency and re-established diplomatic ties with China.

"Built into the U.S. system is change," he said. "Here's hoping the change is for the better."

Nye said he didn't set out to be a science television star. He said that when he graduated from Cornell University, he planned to be a mechanical engineer but was frustrated when the companies he worked for seemed uninterested in making better products.

At Cornell, he said, he studied under astronomer Carl Sagan, who was credited during his life with popularizing science. And like Nye, Sagan became familiar to millions through television with his show "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage."

Nye predicted that the students in the Bob Carpenter Center – and there were well over 2,000 – would likely live to see life discovered on Mars.

He predicted it would be fossilized bacteria and if it is discovered "it would change the course of human history."

There are two great questions that we all ask, he said: "Where did we come from and are we alone in the universe?"

Nye didn't set out to be that guy who made science fun for school-aged children.

But when he started volunteering at the Pacific Science Center in Seattle, he had an epiphany.

"The thing to do," he concluded, "was to make an investment in young people. I wanted to influence you all ... so you would be scientifically literate."

Newark Charter School student Marley Joyner, 16, of Newark, said she grew up watching Nye on TV, as did University of Delaware neuroscience major Lydia Hadley.

"I love Bill Nye," Joyner said. "His lessons are always super fun."

Nye said he developed his curiosity about the world from his parents. His father, who was a prisoner of war during World War II after he was captured by the Japanese on Wake Island, had a fascination with sundials and wrote a book about them. His mother, he said, was a codebreaker during the war.

"She was very good at puzzles," he said.

When Jenkins described how he sent his students out into White Clay Creek State Park to observe nature, Nye used it as a teaching moment.

"When you go exploring, you will make discoveries," he said. "You will have an adventure."

Contact Molly Murray at (302) 463-3334 or mmurray@delawareonline.com. Follow her on Twitter @MollyMurraytnj.