“Lately, I have been doing calculations as well as looking back at old NASA footage and raw data from satellites hovering above Earth. And I just can’t escape the conclusion that the Earth might actually be flat,” said the deep fake Tyson before the real scientist emerged, stating these words were not his own.

The astrophysicist said that deepfakes are acceptable when clearly used for parody, but become problematic when people cannot tell they are fake. He also said that while it did not bother him initially, the deepfake has shaken him and is scary.

“I didn’t think much about deepfakes until I got deep-faked. The early stuff is fine if it’s parody, and if it is obvious it’s parody,” said Tyson, adding: “But when you do this and the viewer does not know it’s a parody, then you are crossing a line.”

“Obviously, I’m not alone in this landscape as a victim of deep fakes. There are many, many celebrities out there. They are public celebrities who have been deep faked in ways that are also affecting the integrity of their actual message that they would post on their authentic platforms.”

As the deepfake video went viral, social media users reacted to it and expressed shock over what AI is capable of doing.

One X user said, “Doesn’t sound like him.. The Emotional inflections he has in his voice aren’t there… HOWEVER ** if you don’t watch him alot or haven’t talked to him you would never know and that’s crazy”

Another said,”At this point, the only way you can really tell is the noise in the hair. The hair is so complex that AI has a hard time figuring out how it’s supposed to look frame by frame.”

“uhm i really hope no one uses a clip of me for something like this it’d made me so sad because if u asked nicely id happily give it to u,” said a third user.

“Damn… Honestly convinced the second segment was also a deepfake,” said a fourth user.