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gah! creation scientists are at it again. they have set up a creation museum in kentucky.
i don't even know where to begin. these people are fucking WACKO!
ABC has a video about it. it's just crazy to see actual people saying this crazy shit.
i don't normally like to ridicule people for their beliefs. the impulse is strong and difficult to resist in this case, however, because this particular topic hits several annoyance buttons for me. i don't like dogmatism of any kind, whenever and wherever i meet it; and for some reason fundamentalist christian dogmatism gets my dander up more than other dogmatisms. (probably because i grew up in an area dominated by the ultraconservative, fundamentalist, calvinist, christian reformed church.) it's the combination of proselytizing and disguising dogma as science to make it more "palatable" to mainstream, secular audiences. in other words...proselytizing that pretends to be something else. even worse, to my mind, is dressing this crap up as cultural criticism, as if this "critique" of science is simply one perspective within the realm of rational discourse on the subject. one guy, ken ham, in the video says that it's "great" if kids call their biology teachers "liars" because "this is meant to challenge people." whatever. but it's not actual cultural criticism, it simply mimics the form of cultural criticism in order to dupe people. the expressed goal of creation scientists is not to sustain dialogue on this subject, but to change public policy associated with the teaching of science in public schools, and ultimately to replace scientific education with religious education and the inculcation of a so-called "absolute morality" (to quote one CS guy from the ABC video). in short, the goal is to convert the world to fundamentalist christianity. the ABC video concludes with the reporter quoting the museum's official statement about who their 2 main audiences are: 1) "christians, who need scientific evidence to bolster and defend their faith"--this is the height of ridiculousness. why would you need "scientific evidence" (!) to defend your faith...and against WHAT??? well, science, of course. fight fire with fire and science with science, i guess. and 2) "non-christians who need to be saved."
thanks, but no thanks. if i have to swallow this syrupy pseudoscientific crap in order to get into "heaven," i'd rather risk hell.
i did get a laugh out of a couple of things in the video, though: the animatronic "adam and eve" that look like overgrown barbie & ken dolls (except that they're brunette) and live alongside frolicking animatronic dinosaurs; and the "angels" in the movie they show at the museum. i'd be laughing a lot harder if the piece hadn't opened with the factoid that 60% of americans believe that god created the earth in 6 days. one thing about the animatronic dinosaurs that i also find highly amusing and deeply ironic: they appear to be modeled on the current paleontological understanding of dinosaur anatomy and physiology (i.e. that dinosaurs were warm-blooded and fast, with spines oriented horizontally and tails extended straight behind them, as opposed to the older theory that they were cold-blooded creatures that stood more upright with their tails on the ground to sort of prop them up).
i don't even know where to begin. these people are fucking WACKO!
ABC has a video about it. it's just crazy to see actual people saying this crazy shit.
i don't normally like to ridicule people for their beliefs. the impulse is strong and difficult to resist in this case, however, because this particular topic hits several annoyance buttons for me. i don't like dogmatism of any kind, whenever and wherever i meet it; and for some reason fundamentalist christian dogmatism gets my dander up more than other dogmatisms. (probably because i grew up in an area dominated by the ultraconservative, fundamentalist, calvinist, christian reformed church.) it's the combination of proselytizing and disguising dogma as science to make it more "palatable" to mainstream, secular audiences. in other words...proselytizing that pretends to be something else. even worse, to my mind, is dressing this crap up as cultural criticism, as if this "critique" of science is simply one perspective within the realm of rational discourse on the subject. one guy, ken ham, in the video says that it's "great" if kids call their biology teachers "liars" because "this is meant to challenge people." whatever. but it's not actual cultural criticism, it simply mimics the form of cultural criticism in order to dupe people. the expressed goal of creation scientists is not to sustain dialogue on this subject, but to change public policy associated with the teaching of science in public schools, and ultimately to replace scientific education with religious education and the inculcation of a so-called "absolute morality" (to quote one CS guy from the ABC video). in short, the goal is to convert the world to fundamentalist christianity. the ABC video concludes with the reporter quoting the museum's official statement about who their 2 main audiences are: 1) "christians, who need scientific evidence to bolster and defend their faith"--this is the height of ridiculousness. why would you need "scientific evidence" (!) to defend your faith...and against WHAT??? well, science, of course. fight fire with fire and science with science, i guess. and 2) "non-christians who need to be saved."
thanks, but no thanks. if i have to swallow this syrupy pseudoscientific crap in order to get into "heaven," i'd rather risk hell.
i did get a laugh out of a couple of things in the video, though: the animatronic "adam and eve" that look like overgrown barbie & ken dolls (except that they're brunette) and live alongside frolicking animatronic dinosaurs; and the "angels" in the movie they show at the museum. i'd be laughing a lot harder if the piece hadn't opened with the factoid that 60% of americans believe that god created the earth in 6 days. one thing about the animatronic dinosaurs that i also find highly amusing and deeply ironic: they appear to be modeled on the current paleontological understanding of dinosaur anatomy and physiology (i.e. that dinosaurs were warm-blooded and fast, with spines oriented horizontally and tails extended straight behind them, as opposed to the older theory that they were cold-blooded creatures that stood more upright with their tails on the ground to sort of prop them up).
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