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From: climatebrad
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  • OIL IN ALASKA. YOU CAN'T EXPLAIN THAT

  • How is it that some one as phenomenally stupid as Joe Barton can get re elected? And under what scenario is it considered a good use of time to have such a person asking questions of the Energy Secretary?

  • LOL how did this moron get into congress. Do americans try to find the stupidest person they can to elect into congress?

  • My favourite bit is how he looks when Sec Chu explains that plates drift. "They just drifted up there!?" with an incredulous look on his face like Chu was an idiot

  • Man!

  • How could anyone explain that complex process in 60 seconds to, i'm guessing, a creationist? joe barton is a smug, arrogant fool.

  • Oil came from dinosaurs. Oil is in Alaska. Therefore, in order for dinosaurs to be in Alaska, it had to be warm at some point for them to survive. Hence, the earth is going through a natural cycle of warm and cool and there is no 'global warming'.

    See? All you have to do is follow the mind set of a child and suddenly all the Republicans make sense!

  • @opszanski It's the Chewbacca defense!

  • wow! Look at that smug little douchebag grin that asshole has. Hey let's sabotage someone smarter than us with an extremely complex and somewhat vague question that can NOT be answered reasonably in 60 seconds. I don't give a fuck about the bickering about global warming and this or that on here. My statement revolves around DELIBERATELY asking such an involved question with a 60 second countdown. It is petty and childish.

  • Look at the giant smirk on that dumbass motherfucker's face. I hate people who are SO stupid they don't KNOW they're stupid. JFC.

  • ...this "tropical Poles" popular myth just will not die.

  • FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA­AAAAAAAAAART

  • @skyfall33 Forget oil. We'll have limitless energy for generations to come if we can just harness the power generated from the amount of ridiculous spin in your post.

  • @skyfall33 No, the man really sounded like an idiot. Sorry.

  • Wow...the ignorance of Congressman Barton knows no bounds.

  • the problem is i'm sure barton probably also believes the earth is not older than the bible says so the earth has always looked the way it has. that a person like him and bachmann could nonetheless have such an impact on climate policy despite having an embarrassing level of ignorance on the subject is why our species will fail.

  • Wouldn't it obvious

  • I bet that guy thought he was proving something by asking that question to sec chu but the only thing he proved was what an idiot he is.

  • I'm not an American but am really embarrassed for those of you who are if this is indicative of the intellectual capacity of your average politician. Not that I think the politicians from a lot of other countries wouldn't be just as ignorant. Perhaps they wouldn't be broadcasting it though

  • @Argonaut121 worse. It's the intellectual capacity of many people in general. How do you think these people get elected in the first place?

  • Dr. Chu has one of the hardest jobs in the world.

  • that guy is an idiot... he really needs to read a book.

  • Joe Barton, you are one stupid man or your fooling around wasting people's time with your stupid questions, its one or the other....

  • And the world collectively facepalmed.

    This is almost as bad as the expanding earthers...

  • These politicians are narcissistic and truly believe they're on the same level of intelligence as the scientific community.

    Sadly most of the population in Texas love Mr. Barton and his 5th grade education level. It really is simple, when a group of lower intelligent beings encounter one higher, they look upon them as: liars, tricksters, magicians, etc. Because they can't understand or communicate at the same level.

  • I'm sure I'm not the only one who's said this but...our politicians are pathetically ignorant, and it almost makes me ashamed to be american. like, i practically have to apologize to foreign people when I say i'm american. it's embarrassing.

  • @ScientiaVeritasEtLux That's deep, man. Don't worry though, most of us know not all Americans are ignorant. We also have pretty dumb politicians in the UK as well... Or at least, they tend to focus on schoolground-esque arguments as opposed to coming together in order to solve anything. American politicians are dumb, ours are arrogant and nitpickers :P

  • Folks, this is the guy that at the moment has majority support to become the Chair of the House Committee of Energy and Commerce. BTW, he also thinks windmills will slow the wind down.

    Our country is doomed.

  • @ShadowGryffindor lol classic!!!

  • I hadn't seen this in about a year and it's still so incredibly painful to watch.

  • Look at the fucking smirk on this fucking law makers fucking face. This is the same criminal fucker who fillated BP on national fucking TV. He shoved his fucking nose so far up BP's asshole it stuck out through the nose. Apologizing for BP. This motherfucking jerk of a senator cares less about us and more about BP.

  • Did Joe Barton finish high school? It wasn't put there by 'god' you idiot!

    The sad thing is, Joe Barton sincerely believes he baffled Dr Chu with his complicated question...

    Listen to the laughter of Chu and you realise he isn't stumped but dumbstruck by the stupidity of the question...

  • priceless

  • wtf was that? can't believe a politician asked something like that, and to a nobel laureate!? plainly, wtf

  • Is it relevant whether Alaska was in a warm climate for oil to be created? I was under the impression pressure and geothermal heat are sufficient to create the conditions.

  • @tsuba14 I imagine, though, that you'd need a warm climate for enough living creatures to live, die, and form the substantial oil reserves that Alaska has.

  • @tsuba14 It is relevant that sufficient plant material was at that place for some time to produce the original source of the oil. Dr Chu tries to explain that place was somewhere else way back when the source was laying down material that would become oil and moved to where Alaska is now with the rest of the continent as it drifted over geologic time. Barton proposes in his questions that the land didn't move, but that the Arctic was tropical for long periods of time.

    Most people agree with Chu

  • Joe Barton should be in school, not in Congress. Is he representing BP and stupid people?

  • Wow, Barton is truly an idiot. Who elected that bozo?

  • Why is this Barton on the energy commission? Obviously, he's in the pockets of the oil companies and should be removed from this position because of conflict of interests and possible corruption in dealings with BP. We won't get any Green legislation out of him!!!!!

  • Tardton R-TX

    That is a surprise.

  • SMIRKING CREATIONIST SENATOR THINKS HE PULLED ONE OVER ON NOBEL LAUREATE PHYSICIST: DETAILS AT 11

  • @blackhossproductions @kangsan2014

    and his kind of awareness resulted in our continued prosperity all across the globe. we must thank them properly. I've never felt such a strong urge to do the chair prank.

  • Of course this ignorant asshat probably believes the earth is 6000 years old so that oil forming and plate tectonics moving continents over millions of years are things completely beyond his grasp.

  • LOLOL, Mr Barton is a joke!!

  • its funny how the representative is smug enough and ignorant enough to think that he is completely embarassing the scientist.

    quite the opposite mr. barton. quite the opposite.

  • give the poor guy an hour at least ,

  • I'm not saying he invoked God. He may just be ignorant of the theory and not know how to ask the question.

  • So basically he's asking the guy to explain quantum physics in 6 seconds convincingly. what did he expect.

  • The Arkansas senator said it best while in an interview with Bill Maher that was featured in Bills movie Religulous, You dont have to pass an IQ test to be elected Senator.

    Of course he was smart enough to realize as soon as he said it that he had stuck his foot in his mouth.

  • i dont think the guys an idiot i think he's just asked an unreasonable question for the given amount of time. simple question not simple answer.

  • No doubt that it was an unreasonable question for the given amount of time. That Senator had to know that. If he didnt, then he is an idiot. If he did know that it was unreasonable, then he is dishonest for asking it.

    Most likely both

    He asked the question knowing that the answer would be incomplete.

    Of course his answer is simpler. God did it. Doesnt give a lot of detail...

  • Joe Barton is lacking in the common sense department. Duhhhh the tectonic plates move over time. How do you think oil and gas got up there so far north. Im sure he doesn't know what Pangea was or continental drift is. AAhhhh Jesus told God to put the oil there to use up all the resources on earth. That is why oil is found near Mount Sinai where it all began, I mean the oil.

  • Good god! Barton = half-wit. I'm not surprised he disables comments on his own Youtube post of this video. Thanks for reposting climatebrad.

  • I like how Barton asks "our scientist" for his professional opinion before completely ignoring him and offering his own hypothesis.

    The implication he's trying to make is obviously that the Earth was sometimes warmer than it is now. He's trying to say "Global Warming is no big deal because it happened before" but that ignores the CRUCIAL MATTER of the UNIQUENESS of the RATE of increase in the last 40 years.

    Basically Barton is an idiot dressed as a moron dressed as a congressman.

  • I didn't notice any comments on here about the direct causation of increased warmth retention and increased solar flare activity. Gore's graph shows warmth PRECEDING carbon output while it is actually solar flares that precede warming.

  • This was just one question by Barton to Chu. Barton's YT channel has the same clip. But, gtuess what. Barton doesn't allow comments on the video or his channel. I wonder why that is?

    It's funny that Chu and a lot of other scientists have lecture vids on YT that are nearly an hour long. I doubt your attention span would suffice.

  • Barton represents part of Dallas and in East Texas the major oil reserves were created in the Cretaceous Period (98 myo) when the North American plate was pretty much in the same position it is now.

    His comment "it just drifted up there..." I think really only shows ignorance about Alaska specifically and not of general geology or petrology which he may actually understand because it's important here in Texas.

    Anyone really think Pelosi or Reid would know anymore?

  • Barton didn't know that that the oil/gas in Alaska was created from deposits laid down when the Alaska plate was NOT in it's current position.

    It's stupid to bash him for not knowing that SPECIFIC fact. I bet 99.99% of the population doesn't know that either.

    Barton assumed the oil/gas deposits were created when (the plate of) Alaska was in it's CURRENT position.

    Barton was trying to make the point that Alaska must have been warmer in the past and then got cooler.

  • Wow...I didn't know the Texas Congressman was that ignorant.

  • Barton obviously was trying to trip Chu up. Of course Barton knows how tthe oil and gas got there -- he WORKED for Atlantic Richfield.

  • Joe Barton is the most entertaining type of moron- the type that doesn't mind demonstrating his tremendous lack of education in public, with a smile that suggests that he's perfectly happy with the knowledge that he's the dumbest man in the room.

    Of course, Barton no doubt is trying to "prove" that since Alaska was warm thousands of years ago, that means there's no man-made global warming. What a moron. Entertaining, though.

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  • what a stupid dick

  • Chu is not stupid. He is a political hack. It is only his job to say stupid things.

    Don't be so hard on the guy.

  • i meant joe barton. joe barton is a stupid dick, you are also one

  • Well, I think, Barton, a person who does not believe in climate change and try to humiliate scientists, just tried to make his point by asking this question. He wanted to prove that Alaska and the North Pole used to be much warmer....so what's wrong with getting warmer now....he was trying to make his points by his stupidity....I'm not a liberal, so I'm not saying against the conservatives but I have to agree that a lots of republicans are pretty dumb!!!

  • Barton obviously does believe in climate change. His point was that the earth must have been far warmer at some point in the past or there would be no explanation for the vast oil deposits ANYWHERE in the world, let alone Alaska.

    Congratulations on declaring yourself not to be a liberal. You're IQ seems a bit below that of the average conservative, but you will find that we are a forgiving lot. Welcome, friend!

  • Well, if My IQ is below that of the average conservative, so I must congrats you guys then....because you guys are a bunch of high IQ, super smart people....and my guess would be at least 50% of your people should have a doctorate and are members of Mensa...take care, friend!

  • Typical republican stupidity. What a disgrace our country's education services have become.

  • No, it is a danger to us all. And the arrogance of senators is a danger to us all. Please Americans, for the sake of humanity, vote these idiots out of office.

  • I don't like how Senator Barton thinks he's trumped climate change by pointing out that the world was once warmer. It's true, but the rate at which global temperature is increasing is unprecedented, especially because it is occurring in the middle of an interglacial. A sudden disturbance in seasonal climate patterns is going to send shockwaves through the biosphere. The consequences are a danger to the developing world where people are much more dependent on the weather.

  • ventose123:

    You don't seem to understand the meaning of the term "interglacial".

    You also are apparently not familiar with the geological record in which there is evidence of far greater and faster temperature swings than anything the warmers are considering today.

    At any rate, most of your liberal leaders don't know either the term "interglacial" or its definition. You may take heart in the knowledge that you are, at least, one up on most of them.

  • An interglacial is a warm period between glacial periods. We are currently in the Holocene interglacial.

    There are a couple of instances of periods of faster warming, but those occurred at the end of glacial periods.

    Get off your high horse, stop making unfounded claims of ignorance, and try to keep up with the scientific debate instead of the political one. I don't mean just cherry picking sources that concur with your opinion.

  • I'm a couple of years older than Joe Barton and can tell you that when I was in school plate tectonics was not as well understood as it is now, but the basics were known and taught in 4th grade in the Kansas public school that I attended. What is even more deplorable than Barton's ignorance is his smug notion that he has outwitted Dr. Chu. Perhaps Barton should consult some experts in the field of geology.  The big Texas oil companies do avail themselves of such people, one would assume.

  • mooster47

    Very sorry to burst your bubble, but you missed the point entirely. Chu was using "plate techtonics" to dodge issue. Nothing particularly bright about that.

    Barton neither asked for, nor needed, a lesson in this subject. Any oil man in Texas can tell you more about plate techtonics than you will ever have the patience to hear.

  • Eh no, he was suggesting that alaska at one point was warmer, and thus that human induced climate change is a lie.

    The truth is that the land known as alaska was at one point warmer, but it wasn't where it is now due to plate tectonics, thus making the point moot. Chu wasn't dodging any points at all, he was trying to guide Barton through a very simple process that I learnt of when I was about 12.

  • Indeed, and Barton was completely right. Just try a bit and read about the temperatures in Alaska in Tertiary (which is when the Alaskan oil was formed) or even better, about the temperatures and climate of the whole Tertiary world. It was very warm and green then. And while being at this, you may check the position of Alaska in Tertiary, approximately where it is now.

  • The entire Mesozoic before the Tertiary was warmer than the Tertiary. The span of the Tertiary was mark by a trend of gradual cooling.

    You have no way of knowing that the oil was formed during the Tertiary. Given that the entire Mesozoic was warmer and spanned a longer time, it might be a better assumption to say it was formed during the Mesozoic. Alaska was also further south during the Mesozoic.

  • Alaska was further south back then

  • Sigh. Barton asked Chu about the origin of oil in Alaska simply because he knew all too well that this oil is from Tertiary, when Alaska was much warmer than today WITHOUT moving from the place it occupies now. The whole world was warmer then. And the Secretary Chu didn§t know this and instead started going abou the continental drift, which was not the case of Alasla. Alaska didn´t move from the high latitudes since then. Just visit the Scotese Paleomap project site and look at the animations.

  • What's most incredible: Joe Barton still has this exchange proudly posted on his youtube account.

  • LOL. I have no idea why I find this adorable.

  • Jesus H Christ, I learnt about plate tectonics when I was in PRIMARY SCHOOL! Where the fuck was Mr. Barton educated?! It's staggering ignorance...no wonder Dr. Chu was confused.

  • As someone who was educated in Texas, I am going to have to guess Texas. You pretty much have to educate yourself in the school system here.

  • Rep. Joe Barton posted this exchange with Energy Secretary Chu on his own channel. He characterizes Secretary Chu as being "puzzled" by the question.

  • doesn't seem like he have a point to make

  • Kind of funny that Barton is asking this question when he tried to block environmental legislation this month by proposing 450 amendments. It would've blocked legislation aimed at stopping global warming.

  • does someone have to believe the world is more than 7,000 years old to understand plate tectonics?

  • did the rep have a point to make with that question?

  • For a person with Down's syndrome Barton does pretty well.

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  • Somebody take that idiot out behind the capitol building and beat him with a hose until he learns something.

  • "I have 1 minute of time to interview a Nobel Price winner let's ask him a question I should have learned in 3rd grade!"

  • These are the people we send to Congress? What education level does Barton have?

    This video should be titled: "How to Make a Fool of Yourself in 1 Minute or Less."

    He's seriously trying to take on Nobel Award winning scientist! what a joke

  • The Nobel prize is meaningless. It only means he's an establishment figure and he's part of the team that is destroying the country. I mean, Obama is getting a Nobel Prize for being black. LOL

    Peak oil is a fraud, there's plenty of oil in the ground and it will never run out, at least not for a long time. And by that time, we'll have a new technology.

    The Jews are behind it all. Get rid of them and you won't be so uptight. Unless you are a Jew, of course.

    Never trust a man with the name Chu

  • Oh yeah, particle physics discovery has nothing to do with Chu an the Nobel. Right!

    I love the way Dr Chu almost fell out of his chair. Barton's queston was so sophomoric. He was a buffoon for asking it with no real time remaining. Chu did give him the short and correct answer.

  • Umm, Steve was born in Missouri. St. Louis, MO. Maybe he will run for president one day. He could, you know.

  • Actually, no, he can't. He's too smart to run for office. He has better things to do.

  • Yeah, tbone, he'd go back to Missouri.

    Or..!!!

    Your idea brings up an interesting screenplay:

    If he and all other Americans left the country and went to where their ancestors came from (Europe, Africa, Asia, etc.) (and didn't walk from), the only humans here would be the "first Americans" who are said to have walked from Asia, anyway - which was almost the same land as the U.S. back then.

    Would you go back anywhere?

    I'd go to Jamaica

    ...and then the moon!! - which used to be Earth too.

  • Chu's main job is really to implement methods to deliver energy efficiently.

    I don't understand the significance of the question.

  • The Rep is trying to make it seem that scientists don't know anything for sure.

    It probably was very much hotter at the north pole in the past and there were NO humans around to observe it.

    He was making political points with his (in his opinion) stupid voters!

  • You may have a point. For a Representative, he sounds an awful lot like a 15 yr old on YT fresh out of homeschool.

  • Click "more info" under the uploader's username. There's some logical commmentary on what's going on here.

  • So it just drifted up there?

  • yep

  • Oh snap I got dat dern smart scientist riht wur i wan 'im

    ah shit sun oudda tim'e

  • 3)A decrease in snow caps will lead to more radiative absorption from the sun. (albedo effect)

    If this is just the beginning of the current state of warming and it is caused by humans, then all these natural feedbacks will accelerate the warming to unprecedented levels.The likelihood that humans are contributing to climate change is estimated at over 90% by the IPCC. In my OPINION, this is a risk that we shouldnt take. Chu says that even a 50% risk deserves international concern.

  • Chu just shot from the hip - and hit his FOOT, (which proceeded into his mouth!). NO MR. CHU! It was LESS than 100 MYA and plates could NOT have traveled all the way from the tropics in such a short time. From scotese(dot)com, it was simply LUSH there cuz it was a LOT warmer back then, (and the ocean currents were NOTHING like they are now either). Rock samples PROVED IT! The kind of person who just makes stuff up as they go seems to be typical of the entire Obama administration.

  • It just shows that the rigid head-in-the-sand dogmatic approach for which conservatives are vilified is also common amongst the liberal dogmatic global warming activists. Hey, let's come to a conclusion first and then try to bend the truth any way we can to support our position.

    How about spending 10 good solid years unbiasedly studying this subject and then bring forward the findings...

  • I am a UC Berkeley student. Ill explain. Oil in the arctic is the accumulation of millions of years of photosynthetic material that under right conditions, will compress into fossil fuels. Barton is trying to make the argument that global warming is natural and the arctic was warmer during some point in history, therefore plants and animals must have thrived in the arctic.

  • The only thing that your being a UC Berkeley explains is that you're a cunt. Now STFU.

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  • Jason Radley, did that rejection letter leave you a little bitter my friend?

  • Not any more than yours from that comic writing class.

  • St Peter asks mother theresa, ghandi and a berkeley student each "what do you believe?"

    Theresa replies, "I believe in helping the less fortunate," so St. Peter grants her a seat beside him.

    Ghandi replies, "I believe in non-violent protest," so Ghandi gets a seat next to St. Peter.

    The Berkeley student replies "I believe youre in my seat."

  • I told you already: comedy is not your forte. Regurgitating climate change talking points presumably is.

  • The truth is, climate change is natural, but not to the extent that humans are accelerating temperature rises. Prehistoric climate change is caused by changes in the earths orbital precession, eccentricity and axial tilt. It would take hundreds of thousands of years before we feel these natural effects. The climate conditions that created the arctic oil millions of years ago would not be suitable for humans today. This is why idiots like Barton need to go back to school.

  • LumanLin,

    How about climate of a thousand years ago, when the arctic tree line was much further north than it is today? And glaciers in the alps were much smaller than they are today?

    Do you think the climate of a thousand years ago would be suitable for humans today?

    I'm thinking a bit more humility is needed all around. How did we become so confident in our computer models that we believe them in preference to on-the-ground evidence?

  • "Prehistoric climate change is caused by changes in the earths orbital precession, eccentricity and axial tilt."

    How about plate tectonics? D'you think maybe the continental shifts, and resulting volcanoes, changes in oceanic currents, etc, might have anything to do with it?

    [And what evidence is there that a Cal education is helping you think clearly?]

  • LumanLin, about that hundreds of thousands years allegedly required for feeling cilimatic changes - do you know, that when the last glaciation ended, Europe managed to get ice-free AND covered with woods in the course of mere 1000 years?

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  • EWCZ, that may be true, but I'd like a source of citation. Thanks for the intelligent discourse. This is rare for youtube. The fact is, there's also feedback mechanisms for the warming that is happening right now. For instance:

    1)slight temperature rises can lead to increased global microbial decomposition, which will add additional CO2.

    2)slight temperature rises will increase photosynthetic activity of algal sea mass increasing humidity &water vapor is a stronger greenhouse gas than CO2

  • Comment removed

  • Contrary to the opinions expressed here, Chu' s reply was completely wrong. He didn't know where Alaska has been during Tertiary and Cretaceous, he didn't know what climate was there. The correct answer should have been that the oil from Alaska is of Cretaceous origin or from early Tertiary and at that time it was rather warm there. And Alaska was at that time in high latitudes, almost as it is now. Just look for yourself at the Scotese Paleomaps project website.

  • Barton knows the geological science here. Chu does not. The current geological consensus on hydrocarbon formation on the north slope Alaska is that they were formed in the polar region during the cretaceous era when temperatures were much greater than at present. It did not move there from down south. Chu is obviously a very intelligent man, but he is clearly out of his league in addressing the science of climate change.

  • MrPete is correct. All you scientific illiterates, inclduding Steven Chu, at least on this issue, have got it wrong.

    Deal with it.

    Rule 1 in testifying before Congress:  if you don't know the answer to a question, don't pretend that you do.

  • Amazing... you commenters don't know enough science to know who was correct.

    Chu got the answer WRONG, folks.

    Look up info on when Alaska moved into place. Look up how old the oil deposits are. You figure it out.

  • god this is the most depressing thing i've seen in months

  • I am convinced that The GOP is declining at an ever faster rate after watching this video.

  • ROFL, you should read Barton's youtube account. He thinks he totally trumped this guy.

  • Oh, man...I'm LIZZING! I sent him a message not to remove the video from his account.

  • Notice Barton disabled comments on his copy of the vid. What a maroon. He probably got tired of hearing what an idiot he was from people with triple-digit IQs.

  • Chu tried so hard to explain in simple words to the dork... but chu failed to explained cuz he never ran into a dork like this one.

  • I think the answer he was looking for was, "God put it there!"

  • joe barton posted this same video, but titled it "energy secretary puzzled by simple question" and is NOT allowing comments!

    this is HILARIOUS! fucking brain-dead republican doesn't understand where OIL comes from and makes himself look like a complete MORON, then tries to play it off like he's the man!

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

    WHAT A BUFFOON FUCKING IDIOT!

  • I propose a law that requires at least a HS diploma to be eligible to sit in congress.

  • "I propose a law that requires at least a HS diploma to be eligible to sit in congress."

    Lotta damn good that would do Texas. Have you seen what they are doing to their science standards?

    One could pass the science portion of the Texas High School graduation exam by writing "God did it" to every quesiton.

  • *facepalm*

    And that guy´s a Congressman?

    Sigh, my faith in humanity just died a little.

  • If he thinks tectonic plates are a joke, I am surprise he believed in Noah the ark existed.

  • Someone wasn't paying attention during

    3rd grade earth science. By the way I love the smug look on Barton's face. It's one thing to have an actual question or to not understand something it is another to do what he did.moron.

  • Bartion doesn't think that plate tectonics is a joke. On the contrary, he knew very ell that Alaska wasn't moving much from high latitudes since Cretaceous - that was the point of all this. Alaska didn't move, but it's climate was quite different at that time. Which Chu doesn't know...

  • actually from just watching this video it doesn't indicate whether or not barton is familiar with plate tectonics theory. from the tone of barton's digression about the "oil pipeline from texas" it sort of sounds like he assumed continents never move, thus through his incorrect and nonscientific assumption he stumbled on the correct scientific conclusion that alaska hasn't moved since the cretaceous.

    that said, chu is still wrong.

  • Someone please tell Representative Barton to cancel his upcoming appearance on "Are You Smarter than a Fifth-Grader?" We already know the answer.

  • Poor Chu, he won the Nobel Peace Prize in Physics and now he has to explain tectonic plates in Washington. Thats worst than teaching fifth graders..At least, they read the textbooks.

  • "you're our scientist"--I guess the Bush administration didnt believe in hiring scientist..

  • Mr. Chu, can you tell me how butterflys came to be? Did we fart them out...

  • Did anybody know that Joe Barton posted this video himself online? Yes, he thought he got Chu wrong...lol

  • i think some people should watch a time lapped rendering of what happened after pangea broke up, alaska is always up north

  • Can you explain 500 million years worth of geology in these last 6 seconds? I have no idea how this congressman thinks he stumped Chu. I'm guessing the reason that Barton turned the comments off on his video was because he realized how stupid he was and didn't want a few thousand people pointing it out.

  • Mr. Chu, I have a question for you, why is Congressman Burton suffering from severe mental retardation?

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  • Barton: "wouldn't it be obvious that at one time it was a lot warmer in Alaska..."

    Chu: "No, dumbass. You're obviously not listening to what I'm explaining to you, you fourth grade dropout. It's called 'plate tectonics' and if you have all day I can deliver a lecture on it, or do you really want to just sit up there and try to argue with a Nobel Prize winner like the redneck moron you undoubtedly are?"

  • Actually, it was a lot warmer in Alaska, and everywhere else on the earth, 65 million years ago. But it's also worth pointing out that at that time, ALL OF TEXAS AND MOST OF NORTH AMERICA WAS UNDERWATER. x_x

  • the north american plates have risen do to the plates colliding and rubbing up against each other, you can't compare sea level between the two anymore, the world has chanched abit in the last 500 million years