Work on Neil deGrasse Tyson’s show halted as investigations into sex abuse continue
‘StarTalk’ goes dark as investigators search for the truth.
The last time reported on celebrity astrophysicist and author Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, he was opining about a Truth Force . . . “one that defends against all enemies of accurate information, both foreign & domestic.”
Now, the scientist is being visited by a special type of “truth force,” as investigators look into several allegations that he sexually abused colleagues and associates. Additionally, work on his show has been halted in the wake of this news.
The National Geographic channel will not air any new episodes of “StarTalk” until the investigation into the astrophysicist is completed, the Times has confirmed.
…In November, two women accused Tyson of sexual misconduct in a story published on Patheos. Katelyn N. Allers, a physics and astronomy professor at Bucknell University, claimed she was “felt up” by Tyson at a 2009 party in an encounter she described as “uncomfortable and creepy.”
In the same story Tyson’s former assistant Ashley Watson accused him of “inappropriate sexual advances” that forced her to quit her job.
Allers and Watson’s allegations followed those made several years ago by Tchiya Amet, who accused Tyson of rape while the two were graduate students at University of Texas at Austin in the 1980s.
DeGrasse Tyson has denied all the charges against him. Additionally, he addressed several of the allegations against him in a detailed Facebook post, a snippet of which follows:
For a variety of reasons, most justified, some unjustified, men accused of sexual impropriety in today’s “me-too” climate are presumed to be guilty by the court of public opinion. Emotions bypass due-process, people choose sides, and the social media wars begin.
In any claim, evidence matters. Evidence always matters. But what happens when it’s just one person’s word against another’s, and the stories don’t agree? That’s when people tend to pass judgment on who is more credible than whom. And that’s when an impartial investigation can best serve the truth – and would have my full cooperation to do so.
I’ve recently been publically accused of sexual misconduct. These accusations have received a fair amount of press in the past forty-eight hours, unaccompanied by my reactions. In many cases, it’s not the media’s fault. I declined comment on the grounds that serious accusations should not be adjudicated in the press. But clearly I cannot continue to stay silent. So below I offer my account of each accusation.
Further work on the show will wait upon the outcome of the investigations.
After the allegations appeared, Fox and National Geographic released a joint statement, saying, “We have only just become aware of the recent allegations regarding Neil deGrasse Tyson. We take these matters very seriously, and we are reviewing the recent reports.”
“StarTalk” producers added in last month’s statement that they “are committed to a thorough investigation of this matter and to act accordingly as soon as it is concluded.”
I will admit I am not a fan of deGasse Tyson based on his dreadful “Cosmos” series and his assertions about my second favorite planet in the solar system. However, I hope the investigators do find the truth and justice shines forth in this case.
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There probably is a reason that Degrasse is a show host and and not a working physicist.
I’ve often wondered myself, “Why is this guy famous and advertised as a scientist? What has he done?” The answer is nothing.
His CV calls him a “Science Communicator.” Great. I am a “Math Communicator.” In a former life I was the master of, among other things, the Whiz Wheel. A circular slide rule that told you exactly what route you had to fly for the cameras of the Tactical Airborne Recconnaissaince Pod System (TARPS) to get complete coverage. I don’t want to create a false impression. It’s impossible to become a Naval Aviator (and I was not one, I was an Intelligence Officer) if you have no math ability. But it doesn’t have to be your driving force. It wasn’t for me, but I could work the Whiz Wheel like nobody’s business.
But enough about me, who will have no TV shows produced about him although that would be (blanking) entertaining. Why is the subject at hand the star of anything? Speaking of hands he “Communicated Science,” mostly by Braille. How did he get away with it for so long? He insulted religion.
If one insults religion, one can get away with almost anything. Because that one appeals to a conceit that exists entirely within their own minds. That religion and science are in opposition. If you believe in religion you must reject science. If you believe in science (note I use the phrase “believe in” which is the terminology of faith) you must reject religion.
None of this is true. Probably not the best example I could choose from is Albert Einstein. I think it’s an understatement to say Einstein was a far more accomplished physicist than Tyson will ever be. And Einstein was not an Atheist. Here’s where I injure my case. Einstein didn’t believe in the God of the Bible, a God that was interested in human affairs. But that a creator must exist for Him to create a universe that Einstein with what he admitted was his own limited intelligence could comprehend.
He called that God the Supreme or Universal Intelligence.
https://sillysutras.com/httpsillysutras-comeinsteins-belief-in-god-as-universal-intelligence/
Einstein had, in effect, completed the circle that Aquinas and Augustine had completed centuries earlier. Human beings are created in the image of God. That God acts rationally and consistently. Therefore humans can if they apply themselves begin to understand God’s creation.
Neil deGrasse Tyson is willing to prostitute himself and insult the entire history of science. Any questions about why he is popular with his target audience?
Sounds like someone wants his job and has chosen the #metoo route to career advancement.
But if you want to see a real hatchet job, check out the recent American Master’s show on James Watson. It is only a matter of time before someone suggests that he give up his Nobel Prize.
Anyone know what Odumbo got a Nobel Prize for?
He got it for being a Negro elected President.
“There probably is a reason that Degrasse is a show host and not a working physicist.”
Yes, and that reason may be a perfectly honorable one. For example, that he’s the director of the Hayden Planetarium. Not quite as exalted position as being a cutting-edge astrophysicist, but a respectable one nonetheless.
Why is he the director of the Hayden Planetarium? I have a very good idea of why. He no doubt has an affirmative degree, talks a good line but probably is not up to actually being a working physicist.
https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2016/02/12/can-genes-explain-racial-gender-iq-gaps/
Black-White IQ Distribution (cumulative percentage graph): …… Only one-in-3.5 million (.00003%) African Blacks have an IQ of 140 or higher (genius level). With a population of about 37 million blacks that means there are about 1100 black geniuses in America.
One of those real honest to goodness black physicist geniuses is a personal friend. Neither he or I think that Degrasse is the real deal.
Maybe Tyson and his communist friends should reconsider why we have a constitution in the first place. If he is going to ally himself and defend arbitrary social justice without due process, he better be prepared to live with the arbitrariness of “social justice”. Lots of innocent people in the gulags and re-education centers. Without the inalienable God-given rights guaranteed by our constitution, there is nothing standing between us and devil.
In the rehash of “Cosmos”, Tyson made a point to hammer on religion … from the viewpoint that G_d is constrained by physics, time and space like the rest of us. Obviously, his atheism is not protecting him now. He is an accomplished dancer. He will need that talent now more than ever.
At my annual Christmas dinner with friends, one of the attendees is a genetic researcher with a top university. Someone brought up NASA’s discovery of the massive meteor crater under Greenland’s glacier and the implications about rewriting history about its implication that humans were almost completely wiped out 12,000 years ago. Without any logic beyond his opinion based on scientific research, he has seen no evidence whatsoever of intelligent life existing beyond our planet and so God cannot exist.
He also doesn’t believe in NASA’s conclusions about a meteor over a mile in diameter hitting the planet wiping out the human race (it was bigger than the meteor that supposedly wiped out the dinosaurs).
I asked him whether the event happening at the very end of the Ice Age would have any implications for human history such as explaining the ubiquitous “big flood” stories present in every creation myth everywhere on earth e.g.? And other historical anomalies that would be explained by that event? His reply basically informed me that he is a scientists and I am not.
I suggested he consider the difference between “knowing” vs “believing”. When you boil everything down, even science is reduced to what you choose to believe. Why can’t science reconcile quantum physics to the theory of relativity? Why is 70% of matter missing in the universe?
The further out we look into space, the bigger we discover it is. The further down we look into the structure of matter, we keep discovering smaller and smaller structures. At the upper and bottom ends of “knowing” is a barrier wher “knowing” leads science to “believing”. New discoveries bring new hypotheses to research. Scientists used to define that edge of “knowledge” as the divide between science and philosophy. If science “knows” things, why does that knowledge always need to be replaced? Because it’s a belief system.
Scientists weren’t so arrogant in the past as to declare God to not exist on zero evidence. Philosophically, they have converted science into religion and thereby deified themselves as the new gods.
No one knows that God exists or doesn’t. Even most atheists admit they pray once in a while, particularly when they find themselves in foxholes. Not knowing doesn’t stop them. In the end, we NEED faith to have it all make sense. Science is limited to offering possible answers for questions involving empirical data. If you can’t count it, weigh it or measure it in any way, science has nothing to offer. It is a subset of philosophy.
I never got to the final parts of this condescendingly arrogant “discussion”. Atheists live in a truly cold, pointless existence.
A real scientist can say, “I don’t know” and says it often.
A real scientist is someone who comes up with 5 alternative explanations for the mechanisms underlying their hypothesis, and they test them as or more rigorously than the one they are putting forth. At the other end, a liberal is someone who puts 2 and 2 together to arrive at 5 and then runs with it.
I know that God exists, for several reasons. First, because God intervened directly in my life one early evening in mid-October of 1989, when I was driving alone on a street in Elkhart, Indiana, and cast a demon out of me. I had been a hardcore atheist for around two years at the time, and was by no means seeking God or hoping for a spiritual reality of any sort. Basically, God intervened in my life, gave me a choice, and when I chose Him by saying (and I quote), “God, please forgive me the bitterness and hatred I’ve had; I choose this” (and by “this” I meant the feelings of love and joy and peace and hope that God had shown me, which I hadn’t felt in years), to summarize what happened, God cast a demon of me. I went from being a hardcore atheist to fervent Evangelical Christian within perhaps 15-30 seconds. And I have remained a fervent Evangelical Christian since, and because of, that night and event.
That’s one reason I know that there is a God.
Gee, preening, arrogant a$$clown Tyson is actually a misogynistic douche? Who could have seen that one coming?
Gee, preening, arrogant a$$clown Tyson is actually a misogynistic douche?
“Actually”? No, allegedly. Let’s not throw out the presumption of innocence just because the SJWs have.
But a douche – especially as physicists go.
His reputation among physicists no in show business is quite low. One can always claim sour grapes, but it is what it is.
If Neil was White, he would be teaching freshmen astronomy at a community college in Nebraska.
“However, I hope the investigators do find the truth and justice shines forth in this case.
That would be nice, but this case is more likely to be another “he said, she said”, in which only the accuser and accused will ever know the truth.
We pegged this guy as a poser long ago. He’s a product of the Age of Odumbo, and will go down in ‘history’ as the bozo he is.
Many insiders who know him, mock him behind his back as the hack he is.
“Many insiders who know him, mock him behind his back as the hack he is.”
I agree, and I object to affirmative degrees. I know two high performing black professionals. They actually earned their degrees, but the value of their degrees suffer because of the fairly large numbers of of people who did not actually earn their affirmative degree and who are actually incompetent.
(1) Who says your “idea” is a “very good” one? (2) Why is there “no doubt” regarding his degree? (3) So what if he’s not up to being an actual working physicist? How many of us here could work as one?
Plus, there’s nothing dishonorable about being merely the head of Hayden Planetarium.
Sorry — This was a reply to JusticeDelivered’s reply to me.
As a young man, I loved theoretical physics, spent many years studying relativity, but instead chose to become an engineer. That choice was driven by practical employment considerations. As an engineer I had far more choices in where I could work and it dovetailed better with my interests in running my own business.
Neil deGrasse Tyson graduated the Bronx High School of Science a few years before me but his claim to fame as far as I am concerned remains that he is the guy that runs the laser light show at the Hayden Planetarium.
He’ll next be working as a projectionist at the Pussycat Theater’s reopening in West Hollywood.
So I guess they will be removing “next we are going to take a close look at Uranus” from the Planetarium script. Hey, it was just hanging there. 😉
Is Neil de Grasse Tyson relate to the famed philosopher Mike Tyson? Or perhaps the actress Cicely Tyson?
Is Neil deGrasse Tyson related to the famed philosopher Mike Tyson? Or perhaps the actress Cicely Tyson?