The Creation Debate

Bill Nye and Ken Ham debate the motion “Creation is an adequate account of human origins”. (2.30, use extracts).

Background to the debate can be found at Wikipedia.

Extract:

During his opening statement, Ham declared, “I believe science has been hijacked by secularists.” He followed up by pointing to several examples of scientists who profess a belief in Young Earth Creationism, most notably Raymond Vahan Damadian, a pioneer in the field of magnetic resonance imaging.

Ham also drew a distinction between “historical science” and “observational science”, a distinction the Christian Science Monitor notes is unique to creation scientists. “We observe things in the present, and we’re assuming that has always happened in the past,” said Ham, adding, “You’ve got a problem, because you weren’t there.”

During his rebuttal, Nye asked, “Why should we accept your word for it that natural law changed 3,000 years ago and we have no record of it?”

Nye cited radiometric dating, ice core data, and the light from distant stars to argue that the Earth must be much older than young Earth creationists like Ham theorise. Ham argued that these various dating methods are untrustworthy because they often give varying ages for the same artifacts.

The Genesis flood narrative, which Nye repeatedly referred to as “Ken Ham’s great flood”, was a major topic of discussion, with Nye arguing that a boat constructed according to the parameters given for Noah’s Ark in the Book of Genesis would not float.Nye also calculated that, if there were 7,000 “kinds” of animals on the Ark, on average, 11 new species would have had to come into existence every day for the Earth to contain all presently known species. (Source: wikepedia)

Thanks to Sharon Crisp for this stimulating material.