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Bill Nye discusses our nation's parks and why Earth is the best place to live

Bill Nye discusses our nation's parks and why Earth is the best place to live

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The National Park System is turning 100, and The Verge is celebrating with Wilderness Week: a look at the natural world, its freaky critters, and its future.

Bill Nye may be constantly studying the other planets in our Solar System as the CEO of the Planetary Society, but yesterday, the Science Guy was marveling at what our planet Earth has to offer. Nye stopped by Brooklyn Bridge Park in New York City to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the National Parks Service, which was created by Woodrow Wilson on August 25th, 1916.

"You do not want to live on Venus. Ain’t gonna happen."

We caught up with Nye to discuss why it’s so important to celebrate our nation’s parks and what we can do to help preserve them. One of the biggest threats facing these regions of our country is climate change, says Nye, which means some of the unique features of our national parks may not be around for much longer. "I just got back from Glacier National Park, and there are a few glaciers left. And the official word is 2030, they’ll all be gone," said Nye. "But the park rangers I spoke with — a dozen park rangers over the course of a few days — no, no, five, six, seven years, certainly by 2025, all the glaciers will be gone." For those looking for ways to help preserve these parks, Nye says the best thing to do is vote (though he won't tell anyone who to vote for).

And even though the focus was supposed to be on Earth’s wilderness, we couldn’t help but discuss the possibility of colonizing other planets in our Solar System and whether or not life exists elsewhere in our galactic neighborhood. Though Nye thinks we may find alien life on our neighbor Mars soon, he's not looking to move off of Earth any time soon. "You do not want to live on Venus. Ain’t gonna happen," said Nye. "And I know it all sounds visionary, romantic, and cool, but in the same way you almost certainly never colonize Antarctica, you will never colonize Mars." Pretty sure Elon Musk disagrees.