Buzzfeed asked creationists at the Bill Nye/Ken Ham debate to write a question or comment to people who support science. (The photos of these people, and their comments, are
here.)
Some of them are just astoundingly stupid. ("If we come from monkeys then why are there still monkeys?"
Really? Frankly, it's hard to believe that even a creationist is that ignorant.)
But in the above video, Steve Shives answers all of their questions, and does it in the nicest way possible.
Really, I couldn't do that. ("Does not the second law of thermodynamics disprove evolution?" What, did you think that scientists somehow
forgot about that? If it were that easy to disprove evolution, don't you think someone would have pointed that out by now?)
Maybe I would have started out polite, but by the time I got to the claim that the Bible is a "theory," or that theories are "by definition... not testable, observable, nor repeatable," I'd be spitting fire.
How could you be that ignorant of science, people? We live in the most technologically-advanced society on Earth! How could you know
nothing about science?
But as I say, Shives is just incredibly polite about it. I don't know how he does it.
Venaloid made a video about this, too, and his manner is a little more like what I'd expect from people like me. :)
I like how Jaclyn Glenn did this, too. She requested photos of questions/comments in the same format as the creationists used:
Those are ordinary people responding, and they're as diverse as you'd expect. But all in all, they do a pretty good job of asking tough questions, don't you think?
___
Edit: I'm not going to make a separate post on this, but check out
these translations of the creationists' questions. It's pretty funny.
Posts
2 comments:
i watched that debate and i am not the smartest person in the world but it honestly made me laugh. I love bill nye, i watched his show as a kid and when i came across him a few years ago i still liked listening to him. Ken Ham was almost doing a stand up comedy thing in my eyes, he was contradicting himself at almost every turn. When he would say "bill you know there is a book that explains that" in that smug tone it made me want heckle him. In my opinion bill nye owned that event like the sea hawks owned the super bowl. Ken ham was just background noise.
I didn't watch the debate, just excerpts, but that's been my impression every time I've heard Ken Ham speak. But - somehow - his supporters don't feel the same way.
And the problem with the debate, besides being a fund-raiser for Ham's organization, is that it gave some legitimacy to Ham, just because Nye took him seriously enough to debate.
Remember, we keep hearing "teach the controversy." Well, I'm worried that this will legitimize that view. Obviously, there is no controversy, not in science. Of course, Ham made it very clear that he isn't a scientist, didn't he?
So I don't know. From all I've heard - not just from you - Bill Nye did a very good job. And we need people who can explain science like that. I'm glad to have people like Bill Nye on our side!
Thanks for the comment, Dan.
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