Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 guardpiper wrote:
Not that this Ken character would care (or after reading the OP article, I would assume he would not care), the Roman Catholic Church says that Aliens within the realm of possibility and not an issue. And this was Benedict not Francis saying this.

Link to article:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/the-pope/8009299/Pope-Benedict-XVIs-astronomer-the-Catholic-Church-welcomes-aliens.html

not surprised at all by this.

The RC church has been expanding its tent for years.

GG

I'm watching the Ham Nye debate, and while its intensely frustrating to watch from my point of view as Ham's understanding of science is just so far afield, but at least he seems sincere and he's polite. I'd just assumed he was a fraud, but he does seem to sincerely believe the stuff. In any case, its nice to see two people, even though they have extremely incompatible, even opposing worldviews, have a debate without it resorting to playground rules.

Why debate Ken Ham? He's a moron. I completely agree with Dawkins when he said debating him is pointless and only serves to give creationism legitimacy.

There is zero evidence for creationism. It is pure faith and lies.

 jasper76 wrote:
I'm watching the Ham Nye debate, and while its intensely frustrating to watch from my point of view as Ham's understanding of science is just so far afield, but at least he seems sincere and he's polite. I'd just assumed he was a fraud, but he does seem to sincerely believe the stuff. In any case, its nice to see two people, even though they have extremely incompatible, even opposing worldviews, have a debate without it resorting to playground rules.

Personally I thought he came across as a bit of a dismissive, arrogant tool.

"I have a book that tells me!"

Good for you. See these hundreds of thousands of peer reviewed research papers that don't agree with what you are saying? We could not fit them all into one book unfortunately but we hope you get the picture...

 SilverMK2 wrote:

 jasper76 wrote:
I'm watching the Ham Nye debate, and while its intensely frustrating to watch from my point of view as Ham's understanding of science is just so far afield, but at least he seems sincere and he's polite. I'd just assumed he was a fraud, but he does seem to sincerely believe the stuff. In any case, its nice to see two people, even though they have extremely incompatible, even opposing worldviews, have a debate without it resorting to playground rules.

Personally I thought he came across as a bit of a dismissive, arrogant tool.

"I have a book that tells me!"

Good for you. See these hundreds of thousands of peer reviewed research papers that don't agree with what you are saying? We could not fit them all into one book unfortunately but we hope you get the picture...

He seems to take an intentionally willfully ignorant worldview, but sincerely so. His worldview is actually pretty intellectually nihilistic, IMO. It assumes that we can only know about the present, but anything we extrapolate about what we observe in the present into the past is BS, because we weren't there in the past to physically record the phenomenon. So we can't know anything at all about the past, because we have to assume that God put everything there with the illusion of having aged. Wouldn't hold up in court..."yes your honor, I'm aware that there was blood everywhere and my fingerprints all over the murder weapon. God put them there, not me. If you don't believe me, show me the video." Also assumes God is a trickster who is intentionally trying to fool everyone into thinking the world is older than it is by planting loads and loads of loads of evidence showing that the cosmos is billions, rather than thousands, of years old. To what end, who knows.

This guy is just repeating the old "The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it" argument.

Haven't finished watching, maybe his polite tone will change over time??? Anyway, although ill-informed and seemingly immune to logic, I don't think he's being impolite (so far), or that he's just out there lying to make a fortune...he really seems to believe this stiff sicnerely.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Medium of Death wrote:
Why debate Ken Ham? He's a moron. I completely agree with Dawkins when he said debating him is pointless and only serves to give creationism legitimacy.

There is zero evidence for creationism. It is pure faith and lies.

I disagree. I think it's good for people who are in Ham's camp to hear the opposing view. If 1 in 100 change there mind, or the seed of critical thinking is planted in 1 or 2 minds, that's a net positive. Ken Ham is not converting anyone over to his side with these debates, I wouldn't think so anyway. He's just preaching to the choir that already believes in the literal interpretation of Genesis.

Dawkins, while I enjoy all of his books and enjoy his lectures and debates, is quite frankly too smug and intellectually condescending to debate guys like this, as evidenced by the fact that he won't condascend to participate in debates with young-earthers.

Bill Nye was made for stuff like this (same goes for Tyson). He has a much greater capacity to reach those that disagree with him than does Dawkins, who just turns people off because he treats debate opponents, and thereby those that agree with those opponents, as fundamentally unintelligent.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
He seems to think that the fact that there exist young-earth creationists who are scientists and have published in secular journals, and who maintian their young-erath creationism, is some kind of super-compelling evidence in favor of young-earth creationism. Endless appeals to authority. The evidence for his worldview should be able to stand on its own without endless appeals to authority.

 generalgrog wrote:

 guardpiper wrote:
Not that this Ken character would care (or after reading the OP article, I would assume he would not care), the Roman Catholic Church says that Aliens within the realm of possibility and not an issue. And this was Benedict not Francis saying this.

Link to article:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/the-pope/8009299/Pope-Benedict-XVIs-astronomer-the-Catholic-Church-welcomes-aliens.html

not surprised at all by this.

The RC church has been expanding its tent for years.

GG

The catholic church is pretty tolerant and accepting of science. (all things considering)

In regards to 'aliens', They would just take it as a point of 'omission' and they already believe a figurative creation, which means nothing says God *didn't* make other planets with life when he made the heavens. Genesis was just a description for his earth-bound creations.

I am still kinda impressed of how close the series of events and 'days' in genesis correspond to the periods of time in the creation of earth with a reasonable mathematical formula and a pretty accurate description of the creation of the universe. It would be what I would expect if Neil Degrass Tyson in a Delorean went back in time and dictated science to someone with no frame of reference. The whole 'calendar of the universe' is a great way to explain concepts as they did in cosmos, when taken literally makes people look sad. Maybe after an apocalypse, we will have young earth creationists who believe the world was built in a year due to Neil Degrass Tyson's old Blu-rays.

Aliens will show up, we will still have the Space Pope.

nkelsch wrote:

I am still kinda impressed of how close the series of events and 'days' in genesis correspond to the periods of time in the creation of earth with a reasonable mathematical formula and a pretty accurate description of the creation of the universe.

Genesis states that the sun, moon and the stars were created after the earth, the water, the plants and most importantly after the night and day cycle and you say that this is a pretty accurate description of real cycle of events?

 jasper76 wrote:
He seems to take an intentionally willfully ignorant worldview, but sincerely so. His worldview is actually pretty intellectually nihilistic, IMO. It assumes that we can only know about the present, but anything we extrapolate about what we observe in the present into the past is BS, because we weren't there in the past to physically record the phenomenon. So we can't know anything at all about the past, because we have to assume that God put everything there with the illusion of having aged. Wouldn't hold up in court..."yes your honor, I'm aware that there was blood everywhere and my fingerprints all over the murder weapon. God put them there, not me. If you don't believe me, show me the video." Also assumes God is a trickster who is intentionally trying to fool everyone into thinking the world is older than it is by planting loads and loads of loads of evidence showing that the cosmos is billions, rather than thousands, of years old. To what end, who knows.

I believe that I said at the time it is interesting that "historical science" is a thing he clings to, yet doesn't mention "historical religion"... after all, we weren't there to see if the things mentioned in the bible actually happened or not!

nkelsch wrote:
I am still kinda impressed of how close the series of events and 'days' in genesis correspond to the periods of time in the creation of earth with a reasonable mathematical formula and a pretty accurate description of the creation of the universe. It would be what I would expect if Neil Degrass Tyson in a Delorean went back in time and dictated science to someone with no frame of reference. The whole 'calendar of the universe' is a great way to explain concepts as they did in cosmos, when taken literally makes people look sad. Maybe after an apocalypse, we will have young earth creationists who believe the world was built in a year due to Neil Degrass Tyson's old Blu-rays.

Aliens will show up, we will still have the Space Pope.

There is almost nothing in the account below that correlates, whether literally, metaphorically, poetically, etc, to the current scientific model about the origins of the universe, earth, or life on earth. The bolded items are direct contradictions. As you can see, when these contradictions are removed, you're pretty much left wit God being pleased.

1 In the beginning, when God created the universe,[a] 2 the earth was formless and desolate. The raging ocean that covered everything was engulfed in total darkness, and the Spirit of God was moving over the water. 3 Then God commanded, “Let there be light”—and light appeared. 4 God was pleased with what he saw. Then he separated the light from the darkness, 5 and he named the light “Day” and the darkness “Night.” Evening passed and morning came—that was the first day.

6-7 Then God commanded, “Let there be a dome to divide the water and to keep it in two separate places”—and it was done. So God made a dome, and it separated the water under it from the water above it. 8 He named the dome “Sky.” Evening passed and morning came—that was the second day.

9 Then God commanded, “Let the water below the sky come together in one place, so that the land will appear”—and it was done. 10 He named the land “Earth,” and the water which had come together he named “Sea.” And God was pleased with what he saw. 11 Then he commanded, “Let the earth produce all kinds of plants, those that bear grain and those that bear fruit”—and it was done. 12 So the earth produced all kinds of plants, and God was pleased with what he saw. 13 Evening passed and morning came—that was the third day.

14 Then God commanded, “Let lights appear in the sky to separate day from night and to show the time when days, years, and religious festivals begin; 15 they will shine in the sky to give light to the earth”—and it was done. 16 So God made the two larger lights, the sun to rule over the day and the moon to rule over the night; he also made the stars. 17 He placed the lights in the sky to shine on the earth, 18 to rule over the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God was pleased with what he saw. 19 Evening passed and morning came—that was the fourth day.

20 Then God commanded, “Let the water be filled with many kinds of living beings, and let the air be filled with birds.” 21 So God created the great sea monsters, all kinds of creatures that live in the water, and all kinds of birds. And God was pleased with what he saw. 22 He blessed them all and told the creatures that live in the water to reproduce and to fill the sea, and he told the birds to increase in number. 23 Evening passed and morning came—that was the fifth day.

24 Then God commanded, “Let the earth produce all kinds of animal life: domestic and wild, large and small”—and it was done. 25 So God made them all=, and he was pleased with what he saw.

26 Then God said, “And now we will make human beings; they will be like us and resemble us. They will have power over the fish, the birds, and all animals, domestic and wild, large and small.” 27 So God created human beings, making them to be like himself. He created them male and female, 28 blessed them, and said, “Have many children, so that your descendants will live all over the earth and bring it under their control. I am putting you in charge of the fish, the birds, and all the wild animals. 29 I have provided all kinds of grain and all kinds of fruit for you to eat; 30 but for all the wild animals and for all the birds I have provided grass and leafy plants for food”—and it was done. 31 God looked at everything he had made, and he was very pleased. Evening passed and morning came—that was the sixth day.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SilverMK2 wrote:
I believe that I said at the time it is interesting that "historical science" is a thing he clings to, yet doesn't mention "historical religion"... after all, we weren't there to see if the things mentioned in the bible actually happened or not!

Yup...all of his core arguments so far boil down to "The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it."