One positive thing about the new Ken Ham Emporium is that it will provide endless fodder for cartoonists and standup comics. There are few things funnier than a Biblical Creationist and they will hopefully continue to provide mirth and laughter to millions.
If YECs didn't exist we would have to invent them.
What's even funnier is that they get upset at being the object of so much laughter and their only recourse is "Oh yeah? Well the God I created will be angry!"
Wow that is quite the tour. I love the way they sneer at books and learning. Yeah lets all go back to the bronze age .... ah the good ole days.
I noticed on one of their poster boards with the title
"Evidence of Flood in the Grand Canyon"
They list "Sea Animals Far Above Sea Level" including sponges and thick deposits of limestone as evidence.
What they do is list these bullets of evidence without explaining why it is evidence of a flood, I guess you are just to assume it is without asking questions, then again their clientle problem view asking questions of this nature as sinful - just believe.
Just how did those sponges transport themselves to the top mountains? Creationist quickly evoke "hydrological sorting" as the reason why trilobites never mix with dinos and dinos never mix with mammal fossils. Hmmm... but here we have sponges being transported to the very top of the geological column because I am guessing the chaotic flood waters. Any YEC care to explain.
quote:I don't support any museums, nor would I vote for any of my tax dollars to go to them. Imo, they should all be user funded.
Yeah, because education about natural and cultural history, preservation of natural and cultural artifacts, and scholarly research into such subjects are not worth funding for the benefit of all citizens.
I mean, who would take pride in these as national treasures, and why should my tax money be spent to preserve them and to make sure that everyone can see them?:
In fact, I'm with you. I say we simply stop using tax dollars to fund any museums or libraries. Who cares if that means that the ability to see these national treasures and millions of others will stop being free to the public.
Only people who can afford to pay to see the Liberty Bell and the Declaration of Independence deserve to see it, right?
You support the Geocentrists, the Nation of Islam, and the Holocaust deniers in their museums just as you support Ken Ham's, don't you?
They are each presenting a different point of view than the vast majority of professional historians or scientists in their respective fields.
Just because the Holocaust deniers' and the Geocentrists' views contradict the mainstream consensus view doesn't mean we shouldn't allow the museum, and maybe we should even teach such things in public schools. Equal time, so to speak.
I have just seen a feature on this museum on a BBC Sunday morning religious programme. I am pleased to report that it was broadly ridiculed by the panel of theists as just plain silly.
However I do think there is a serious point.
Should anyone be able to setup a 'museum' to promote their own warped viewpoint just because they passionately believe something to be true and have enough money to publicise their beliefs in this way?
Should an 'Aryan museum' be allowed to exist that presents 'evidence' in a pseudo scientific manner to illustrate the view wthat there is indeed a master race and that other racial types are inferior? Should a flat earther museum be tolerated that presents the 'evidence' that the Earth is flat and at the centre of the universe?
What is the difference between these examples and the creationist museum in principle?
I hope most people will see the creation museum in a similar light to the flat earther museum proposed above (i.e a complete joke) but it is worrying just how many people interviewed in the program were quite willing to believe this nonsense as fact without question.
Here in the UK all the main national museums are free. Having taken my son to the Science Museum and Natural history museums in London for absolutely nothing numerous times recently I can only say long may it last. The ability to wander in and see a specific section or exhibit and come back another day to see the rest makes for a much less intense and more civilised and child friendly museum experience. Although my little boy may only be interested in the animatronic dinosaurs and the like at the moment hopefully he will come to regard museums as the places of inspiration, knowledge and education that they can be when used to showcase and explain the results of detailed evidence based scientific and historical investigation. It is this noble role that the creation museum is so woefully bastardising to the misguided, and possibly even deceitful, ends of it's founders.
quote:Should anyone be able to setup a 'museum' to promote their own warped viewpoint just because they passionately believe something to be true and have enough money to publicise their beliefs in this way?
Yes, but no public fnding.
quote:Should an 'Aryan museum' be allowed to exist that presents 'evidence' in a pseudo scientific manner to illustrate the view wthat there is indeed a master race and that other racial types are inferior? Should a flat earther museum be tolerated that presents the 'evidence' that the Earth is flat and at the centre of the universe?
Yes, but with no public funding.
quote:What is the difference between these examples and the creationist museum in principle?
No difference whatsoever.
I think these museums are great. It is a way for all of the rational, educated people who otherwise don't realize the threat to reason and education the Creationists pose to finally understand how seriously deluded and wacko these creos really are.
Shining a bright light upon such ideas is the only way to expose them.
Now, Creationism will be exposed as the silliness it is to far more people than it was before Ham's museum existed.
I think these museums are great. It is a way for all of the rational, educated people who otherwise don't realize the threat to reason and education the Creationists pose to finally understand how seriously deluded and wacko these creos really are.
Well I hope you are right but when reportedly nearly 50% of the American public, including the president and many other major political and powerful individuals, believe in creationism I am less optimistic that this will be the result.
quote:Should anyone be able to setup a 'museum' to promote their own warped viewpoint just because they passionately believe something to be true and have enough money to publicise their beliefs in this way?
Yes, but no public fnding.
If they are making blatant lies to attract gullible people into paying money for the experience than it amounts to fraud. Thus White Supremacists, holocast deniers, and creation "museums" that charge admission and pretend to educate could be prosecuted. This makes it different from "Dinoland" as an amusement park.
It would be interesting to bring this to trial eh?
quote:Well I hope you are right but when reportedly nearly 50% of the American public, including the president and many other major political and powerful individuals, believe in creationism I am less optimistic that this will be the result.
Here's what I think.
The people who really, truly believe as Ken Ham does will be delighted by the museum, and they always would have been. Those people are, I think a relative minority.
The other, larger group of people who report believing in Creationism haven't really thought about it, and when presented with the wacko conclusions of someone who has, like Ken Ham, they will maybe see that what they say they believe is actually pretty silly once you actually examine the logical consequences.
I mean, I think he's going to lose quite a few people by coming right out and saying that "incest was OK back then, after the flood."
It has nothing to do with faith or beliefs (other than to attract the gullible and ignorant), it has everything to do with selling lies known falsehoods for personal profit and aggrandizement, and the intent of this "museum" is to convince (gullible) people that several known falsehoods are fact.
quote:Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law
Main Entry: fraud Function: noun Etymology: Latin fraud- fraus 1 a : any act, expression, omission, or concealment calculated to deceive another to his or her disadvantage; specifically : a misrepresentation or concealment with reference to some fact material to a transaction that is made with knowledge of its falsity or in reckless disregard of its truth or falsity and with the intent to deceive another and that is reasonably relied on by the other who is injured thereby b : the affirmative defense of having acted in response to a fraud 2 : the crime or tort of committing fraud ”see also MISREPRESENTATION NOTE: A tort action based on fraud is also referred to as an action of deceit.
Legal def. #1a highlighted for empHASis. We are talking lies in exchange for cash.
Though I'm replying to you, this applies to others as well.
I'm not having much luck encouraging people to avoid inflammatory characterizations, which includes characterizing something as a lie or a person as a liar. To show something or someone incorrect only requires providing the evidence. To show something a lie or someone a liar requires information that is usually unavailable. Here at EvC Forum I encourage people to assume someone sincerely believes what they're saying unless there is clear evidence to the contrary.
Look at it this way. To believe that primary creationist sources are lying and know they are lying is as ridiculous as believing that scientists are lying about evolution and know they are lying. In other words, believing that primary creationist sources are lying and know they are lying is to make the same mistake creationists make concerning science.
Yes, I know there are flim-flam artists out there fleecing the religiously gullible for monetary gains, but the vast majority of primary creationist sources are not in it for the money. If you think about it there's just not a whole lot of money to be made in this particular area of religious nonsense - look at Kent Hovind, who despite not willingly paying any federal taxes ever that we know of lived a very modest lifestyle, and if Hovind couldn't get rich by selling the creationist snake oil for all it was worth, no creationist can. While I disliked Dawkins' recent book, I liked his title very much (The God Delusion for those who haven't yet heard of this book), and I think the term deluded, which you've often used yourself, is more accurate and fair, and as long as it is accompanied by the evidence that makes clear why only delusion could explain believing otherwise.
™ Version 4.2
