Anthony Scaramucci making controversial claims on CNN with Chris Cuomo
In a December 2016 interview on CNN, Anthony Scaramucci - the new White House communications director - compared the consensus on climate change to the belief that the world was flat, Slate reported at the time."I know that the current president believes that the human beings are affecting the climate. There are scientists that believe that that's not happening," Scaramucci said.
When CNN anchor Chris Cuomo pointed that the "overwhelming consensus in the scientific community" is that humans are driving climate change, Scaramucci said people also once accepted the idea that the Earth was flat.
"Chris, there was an overwhelming science that the Earth was flat and there was an overwhelming science that we were the center of the world. One hundred percent. We get a lot of things wrong in the scientific community," Scaramucci said.
Cuomo talked over him: "It's called ignorance," he said. "You learn over time."
Scaramucci responded: "I'm not suggesting we're not affecting the change, I honestly don't know. I'm not a scientist. If you're asking for my opinion."
"I'm not," Cuomo said.
As Slate's Phil Plait pointed out, Scaramucci was actually wrong about there being a 100% consensus that the Earth was flat.
"The ancient Greeks knew we lived on a sphere more than 2,000 years ago," Plait wrote.
In the same interview, Scaramucci also brought up another controversial idea: how old the Earth is.
"You're saying the scientific community knows, and I'm saying people have gotten things wrong throughout the 5,500-year history of our planet," he said, then later corrected himself to clarify that he meant human history, not Earth's entire history.
Modern humans have actually been around for roughly 200,000 years, however.
You can watch the exchange below, though the embedded video cuts off before Scaramucci corrects himself.