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Here I continue my thoughts on the debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham on Feb 4, 2014
at the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky. We're still working our way through Ham's
video response to the Bill Nye interview on the BigThink YouTube channel.
I think it's safe to say that Ken Ham considers critical thinking to be important:
"...teach children how to think critically...teach them to think critically...and teach their
children how to think critically..." Ok children, let's apply some critical thinking
to Ham's ideas. "If evolution were true...it would be so obvious
to the kids that it's true. But it's not." An Answers In Genesis article suggests that
Ham accepts as fact that the earth is not flat. But clearly, that fact isn't obvious
to kids. If it were, history books wouldn't be full of examples of entire cultures believing
that the earth is flat. Another Answers In Genesis article suggests that Ham accepts
as fact that many diseases are caused by germs. But clearly, that fact isn't obvious to kids.
If it were, history books wouldn't be full of examples of entire cultures believing that
disease is a result of supernatural forces. Sadly, truth is often not obvious. If it
were, there would be no Christians. "When it comes to bones...you don't dig them
up with photographs..." So where is your photograph of Yahweh creating
the universe? Even if you did have it, where is your photograph of Yahweh endorsing what
Moses wrote? I ask about endorsement in particular because in Matthew 19:8-9, Jesus himself
makes it clear that Moses sometimes wrote things that were not only incorrect, but absolutely
contrary to Yahweh's will. How do you know whether the Genesis account is what Yahweh
intended? "Creationists are teaching children that they're
special, that they're made in the image of 'God'."
True, but they also teach their children that Yahweh created dirt first, and then made humans
out of dirt. I would rather teach children that they are made of the same stuff as stars,
that they are deeply connected not only to animals, but to plants, rocks, the earth,
the whole universe. Superstitionists teach their children that they're actually offensive to
their creator, descended from people so evil that they broke the very order of the cosmos,
so evil that their sin retains all of its original toxic potency, thousands of generations
later, in the bodies--and particularly the genitals--of the children themselves. And
let's not forget the best part of what superstitionists teach their children: if you don't do and/or
say and/or believe the right things, you will spend eternity--eternity--experiencing conscious,
unimaginable agony. "I'll tell you what is real abuse, and I'll
tell you what is inappropriate for children." That's 11.3. Thanks for watching.