The Debate

Maybe you're not out of it as badly as I am.  My head pretty much stays tucked in the sand, and I'm quite happy living in LaLa-Land, thank you.  So this morning I was surprised to hear that, last night, there was a debate between Ken Ham and Bill Nye.

(By the way, I cannot spell Bill Nye's name without the backspace key.  It always comes out "Billy" before I go back and erase the "y.")

The debate is close to three hours long.  No small thing to fit into your day.  If you want to listen, it will be available "for several days" at debatelive.org.

I was not as impressed as I'd expected.

Ken Ham (the creationist) kept stressing that evolution is a belief system and not observable science.  That's definitely true, but I wish he'd given more to-the-point answers too.

Bill Nye (the evolutionist) kept repeating several points.  One could have been easily answered (but wasn't).  The earth has an apparent age that is older than creationists say it is.  Well, of course!  Adam wasn't created as a baby.  In the Garden of Eden, there were already full-grown fruit trees.  So also, rocks and stars would look like they too were "grown up" even when they were only minutes or days old.

Another of The Science Guy's major points was that America needs scientists to compete globally in technology.  Beats me what that has to do with defending evolution.

Another of Bill's claims was that evolution could be disproven by even one counter-example.  He claimed there were none.  Ever.  He said there is not one example anywhere in the fossil record of a species of a particular era being found alongside (in the same rock strata) a species of a supposedly different era.  So ... I remember in the past hearing about examples.  I guess if you're convinced that such fossils cannot exist, you'll discredit any fossils that do disprove your beliefs.

It was also interesting that both sides have unanswerable questions:  "We don't know how to explain that.  It's something we need to study more, to learn more about."  Granted, each side has an easy time explaining some of the other side's big mysteries.  But they both have spots where they say, "I don't know."  From my vantage point, that means neither side can say, "Ah HA!  Caught you!!  You can't explain thus-and-such!  Well, if you can't explain everything, that in itself says you're all wet."




One portion of the debate allowed for questions from the audience.  I thought an interesting question (directed toward the creationist) was, if hypothetically evolution was proven and creation was disproved, would the scientist then still hold to his religion, his Christian faith?  His answer was basically, "It can't be disproved because it's true."  

My answer would have been, "No."  I would then go on to explain that creation cannot be disproved because it is true.  But if we're going to be silly and play The Hypothetical Game, then my answer would be No.  Once upon a time, I sort of believed that evolution was true (because it's what I was unequivocally taught at school) AND that creation was true (because it's what God said).  So I do realize that there are Christians who believe in evolution, Christians who haven't realized the ramifications of what evolution does to theology.  And God, rich in grace, forgives us all for Jesus' sake -- not because we've got our heads on straight about how He made the world.

But when you realize what evolution says about death, and how it is not the result of sin;

and when you realize what evolution says about Adam and Eve, so that Jesus cannot be "the second Adam" (1 Cor 15:22);

and when you realize that God would be lying (and that Jesus would be mistaken -- Mark 10:6) if evolution were true,

then no, I could not be a Christian if I were shown that creationism were impossible.  If creationism were impossible, then the whole of the Christian faith would be unraveled.

And the devil knows that.
Thus his repeated attempts to promote evolution.