“Bill Nye is just another comedian ...”
Seriously, you are exactly right. My first recollection of Bill Nye was from Seattle’s KING TV, Channel 5 about 20 years ago. They ran a locally-produced comedy show called “Almost Live” which followed “Saturday Night Live”. Nye was a member of the cast. He did “Science Guy”, “Speed Walker” and some others.
The “science community” did not mind putting on humorous faces in order to tell scientific truths as understood by the most conscientious scientists. Anyone who remembers the set of Bell Telephone Laboratories science films, for example, would know about that.
The problem isn’t the style, the problem is when it’s hijacked by people who aren’t even trying to do good science in any sense of the word. Bill Nye is NOT the Bell Telephone Laboratories guy! He is an impostor.
“Spock! You’re out of your Vulcan mind!”
I may have just misattributed that Jim Carey joke to Nye, while recalling his Shatner-Does-Broadway sketch. But I also loved Almost Live. Speedwalker and COPS of Ballard, as I mentioned to Tilted Kilt.