In the 1961 movie The Day the Earth Caught Fire, the near-simultaneous detonation of two super-hydrogen bombs near the poles causes a change in the Earth's nutation, as well as an 11 degree shift in the axis of rotation and a change in the Earth's orbit around the Sun.

The verb to nutate was used by MIT physicist Peter Fisher on the television show Late Night with Conan O'Brien on February 8, 2008. Fisher used the term to describe the motion of a spinning ring as it began to slow down and wobble.