Skip to main content

Creationists: Christ or Man? Part Two

Yesterday I took the creationists to task for misrepresenting the science and statements of a number of prominent figures, from Karl Popper to Stephen Jay Gould, and I wanted to continue about the piece in question today.

In the past, I and others (most notably authors like Donald Prothero and Ken Miller) have exposed as false the creationist assertion that, when it comes evolution one must choose between Christ or fallible Man and his opinions. This is the classic false dilemma; millions of people both accept Christianity and accept that evolution occurred. This fact can only be doubted by the fools at Creation Ministries International and Answers in Genesis where their interpretation is the only correct one, and everyone else is compromising.

There is another aspect to this creationist assertion that I think is worth highlighting, for it exposes the Young-Earth Creationists as the hypocrites that they are.

The same science that declares evolution to be true is the very same science that tells us that the earth is very old. The same method, the same way of thinking, that supports evolution is the same that tells us that the climate is changing due to humans. The science that concluded that evolution happened is the same science that gave us the underlying knowledge that led to electricity in homes, cell phones, satellites, the automobile, the computer and the Internet. The science that concluded that evolution happened is the same science that gave us modern antibiotics, modern medicine and modern surgery. This is the astounding, amazing record of the science of "fallible Man", the science that tells us gravity exists and the science that put a man on the moon.

It is this unique method, this way of thinking that we call science, that has improved the condition of humanity more quickly in three hundred years than in the previous four thousand years combined. The science that gave us the medicine that extends our life expectancies is good enough for creationists, but not the science that tells us we aren't a special creation after all.

Creationists condemn society for having accepted the "fallible opinion of Man," as Ken Ham is fond of calling it, when it comes to evolution and thus rejecting Christ in their minds, but in their everyday actions creationists show that Man's opinion is good enough for them in nearly every other aspect of modern existence.  This is the supreme hypocrisy of the Young-Earth Creationists; by their own definition, they reject Christ and choose Man in more situations than not.

Comments

  1. Precisely :) That would also imply that by their definition, we are all either Satanists or Atheists.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Film for Our Time

The jurors take a break in 12 Angry Men On the hottest day of the year, the trial of an eighteen year old boy for the murder of his father concludes--the jurors withdraw for deliberations, tasked with determining whether the defendant is guilty. If they agree, a death sentence will be handed down. The case seems an easy one, with the jury ready to reach a verdict in less than five minutes of deliberation, but one juror is not convinced. Over the objections of the others, he demands a recounting of the evidence presented, arguing that surely a man's life is worth more than a few moments' thought. Over the course of several hours, the jurors weigh the evidence of the case, and with it weightier issues of class, justice in the United States, and the intersection of the two. 12 Angry Men  remains relevant to us as we continue to deal with these issues nearly sixty years after the film's release. The great strength of the film lies in the fact that only two of the jur...

Endless Forms Most Bizarre

Anyone who knows me for more than ten minutes knows of my deep and abiding fondness for dinosaurs. It's a holdover from that phase most children go through, re-ignited during a summer class on the extinct beasts during college. Yet the drawback of being an adult who loves dinosaurs is readily apparent when you visit the shelves of your local library or bookstore. Most dinosaur books published are aimed at a far younger audience than myself, and the books for adults are often more technical works. Imagine my delight in seeing the newest book by John Pickrell waiting to be cataloged at my library! I placed a request for the book as quickly as I could pull out my smart phone, and I was not disappointed! Weird Dinosaurs: The Strange New Fossils Challenging Everything We Thought We Knew , is an excellent overview of many of the fascinating and bizarre new discoveries, and rediscoveries, of the past decade. A journalist and editor by trade, Pickrell is passionate about dinosaurs, ...

A Tale of Sound and Fury

Since the week before it was to be published, Michael Wolff's Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House  has been, by far, the most-talked about book in the country. The furor, prompted by an angry denunciation-by-tweet from the President, a cease and desist letter from his lawyers, and salacious details from the book making their way into the press, immediately catapulted it to bestseller status. Being a political junkie, of course I couldn't resist giving it a read. While the book sold out almost immediately in print, I was lucky enough to borrow the digital audiobook from my local public library. I rushed through it in just a few days - not only because of how engrossing it was, but also knowing that there were a lot of people waiting to read it after I was done. As enjoyable a read as Fire and Fury was, the deep irony of the book is that it would likely have received little attention had it not been for the attacks by the Trump Administration. In attempting to st...