Creationists Demand Equal Airtime With 'Cosmos' 667
Hugh Pickens DOT Com (2995471) writes "Travis Gettys reports that creationist Danny Falkner appeared Thursday on "The Janet Mefford Show" to complain that the Fox television series and its host, Neil deGrasse Tyson, had marginalized those with dissenting views on accepted scientific truths. "I don't recall seeing any interviews with people – that may yet come – but it's based upon the narration from the host and then various types of little video clips of various things, cartoons and things like that," said Falkner of Answers In Genesis who also complained that Tyson showed life arose from simple organic compounds without mentioning that some believe that's not possible. "I was struck in the first episode where he talked about science and how, you know, all ideas are discussed, you know, everything is up for discussion – it's all on the table – and I thought to myself, 'No, consideration of special creation is definitely not open for discussion, it would seem." To be fair, there aren't a ton of shows on TV specifically about creationism says William Hamby. "However, there are entire networks devoted to Christianity, and legions of preachers with all the airtime they need to denounce evolution. Oh, and there was that major movie from a few years back. And there's a giant tax-payer subsidized theme park in Kentucky. And the movie about Noah. And entire catalogs of creationist movies and textbooks you can own for the low low price of $13.92.""
not a debate (Score:4, Informative)
not a debate you would have anywhere in europe, not even in Rome....
the vast majority in europe would just start crying in laughter at the idea of creationism, because it's just so incredibly infantile...
Sorry, this is Fox (Score:2, Informative)
You got the wrong network, for made up stories you'd have to turn to Fox News.
Re:What show did they watch? (Score:5, Informative)
It's fairly easy to show how the eye evolved. That's been debunked ages ago.
Actually the eye is a perfect proof that it WAS evolution rather than creation. Because our eye is perfected for seeing under water, a smart creator (and I guess God is supposedly not an idiot according to creationists) would have created an eye that's better suited to seeing on land rather than increasing the work overhead for the brain to compensate for the shortcomings of the eye we have.
Re:Pay for their own show (Score:5, Informative)
If they want to sell the fiction that 'flu strains don't change and pests can't get resistant to pesticides ...
That is not what creationists believe. They accept that organisms can adapt to their environment. They just deny that these adaptions can lead to entirely new species.
Nice try (Score:5, Informative)
"No, consideration of special creation is definitely not open for discussion, it would seem."
Nice try, except scientists have considered creationism. For instance, Stephen Jay Gould has written screeds analyzing creationism scientifically. The issue isn't a lack of consideration, but rather that such scientists have thoroughly refuted creationism. I actually wouldn't mind a series scientifically analyzing creationism in principle, perhaps along the lines of some of Gould's work, but I somehow doubt that such a public flaying would satisfy the good folks at AiG.
Re:What show did they watch? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Demand all you want (Score:5, Informative)
(The Soviets saw Star Wars as a complete joke.)
Not true. Gorbachev was scared shitless over SDI, and it was really the only big sticking point in negotiations that could have reduced nuclear weapon stockpiles far more drastically in the 1980s than what actually happened. The Soviets responded to the threat of SDI by ramping up production of ICBMs and nuclear warheads, on the theory that it would be cheaper to overwhelm SDI with ridiculous numbers of targets than to try to devise a technological countermeasure or to produce an SDI of their own.
For reference, I highly recommend this book [amazon.com].
Re:Whatabout we demand equal time of our views ins (Score:5, Informative)
Being a scientific organization is one of the major listed justifications for tax exempt status - assuming the other criteria are met.
The part in bold there is kind of the point. Scientific organizations--actually educational organizations of all kinds--can indeed apply for non-profit status, but they have to prove they meet the standards. Churches are assumed to qualify a priori.
Re:Whatabout we demand equal time of our views ins (Score:3, Informative)
No, what I mean is what I wrote: running charities, food shelves, hospitals, orphanages, and so on. Developing academic knowledge of the variance in protein content of a particular wheat variety doesn't actually feed people. You have to give them food for them to be fed. Developing a better bonding process for shingles so that they last 30 years instead of 25 years doesn't actually house people. You have to give them a place to sleep in a building for them to be housed. Scientific work is both useful and important, but it is not the only important work.
Many of the so called "modern ideas" are simply restatements of bad old ideas. But perhaps you can tell me, when the principle of treat people as you wish to be treated, or love your neighbor, become obsolete?
Re:Whatabout we demand equal time of our views ins (Score:5, Informative)
"Yes yes yes this this THIS times a million! "
No, no, no... billions and billions of times. (Yes, I know: Sagan never actually said that.)
Here's the problem with that, and it's such a HUGE amount of history that it shouldn't even need to be mentioned. But it seems that it does, so here goes:
History says very clearly that once you allow government to get involved with religion, or religion with government, pretty soon you have government-mandated religion, or religion-run government. And both of those are Very Bad. Religions have never -- ever, ever -- been good heads of government. And it's pretty obvious why government-mandated religion is just as bad.
That is why we have effective separation of Church and State in the US. But many people misunderstand it.
Contrary to what many people seem to think, the reason for that separation is not to "keep religion out" of everything. At all. It is intended to prevent any kind of official government sponsorhip of a particular religion. Our Founders were intimately familiar with religious persecution, and it was their intent to prevent it. But it was not their intent to suppress religion.
Example: a nearby city government had prayer before every meeting. The prayers were generally given by a Catholic priest, probably just because there was a big Catholic church just down the street. Some people objected, and it went all the way up to the State Supreme Court. This is what the court said (paraphrase):
"There is no law or clause in the Constitution preventing you from having prayer. However, you ARE prohibited from supporting any PARTICULAR religion. Offering Catholic prayer before every meeting is de facto government sponsorship of a particular religion."
The city's answer: now, any religion that wants to participate can get put on their list. They either rotate through the list or draw them at random... I'm not sure which. But the upshot is that they still have prayer before every meeting, but it isn't necessarily Catholic or even Christian. I remember once they had prayers from the local Baha'i faith.
Now, nobody has any reason to object and there are no problems. Even the atheists don't seem to have a problem with it.
Re:Whatabout we demand equal time of our views ins (Score:5, Informative)
In the bible slavery, polygamy, genocide are all fine.
I get that you might have some difficulty accepting that its not to be taken literally, its a common disorder among techies, we have a difficult time accepting that not everything means exactly what it says sometimes since we tend to work in technical absolutes as much as possible ... but if you are so utterly stupid that you think it 'approves' of those things then I realize I'm wrong, you're not that stupid, you're that ignorant.
Let's just take a look at mass murder. I'm sure you remember the story about the walls of Jericho [biblegateway.com], right?
Then the Lord said to Joshua, "See, I have delivered Jericho into your hands, along with its king and its fighting men.["] ... Joshua commanded the army, "Shout! For the Lord has given you the city! The city and all that is in it are to be devoted* to the Lord ... so everyone charged straight in, and they took the city. They devoted the city to the Lord and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it - men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys... Then they burned the whole city and everything in it, but they put the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron into the treasury of the Lord's house... So the Lord was with Joshua, and his fame spread throughout the land.
Maybe that doesn't fit the exact description of genocide, but it is GOD commanding mass murder.
This is my favorite sentence from that chapter:
All the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron are sacred to the Lord and must go into his treasury.
See, the Creator of the Universe needs some cold hard cash, similar to today. You'd think he'd be even better than the fed at printing money being the all powerful ruler of everything, but alas, no.
Regarding the actual definition of genocide, this [biblegateway.com] is him saying to commit genocide:
For the day has come to destroy all the Philistines and to remove all survivors who could help Tyre and Sidon.
Show me where, in anything that I just posted, that it says not to take it literally, because it looks literal to me. Or do you mean that your pastor told you not to take it literally?
The bible as a work of literature has its exemplary moments, and I would encourage everyone to read it, from start to finish. But as a book on morality it is severely lacking in that you can never tell what to take literally, and what to not take literally. I guess use your own judgement? Well, you don't need the bible to do that.
*The Hebrew term refers to the irrevocable giving over of things or persons to the Lord, often by totally destroying them