Creation vs. Evolution

A few days ago - 2/4/2014 - I was witness to the "Creation vs. Evolution" debate that was sponsored by Answers in Genesis and televised via debatelive.org . The debaters were Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis and Bill Nye of TV fame. The choice of debaters might seem somewhat puzzling on the outside - neither man holds a PhD, and neither is considered a top scientist of their respective fields.

However, the choice was obvious for other reasons. Ham and Nye both have earned a living in the public eye with their scientific endeavors. Ham is the founder of the Creation Museum, as well as Answers in Genesis (AiG). Bill Nye was an airplane engineer by trade who went on to make his money doing fun science-related things on a TV program geared to get kids excited about science. You could say their respective scientific merits fall within the realm of capitalism as opposed to research.

I follow AiG, and I also try to keep abreast of scientific discoveries and trends. I observed a growing tension in both camps from people of all walks of life, as they typed out their thoughts on various internet forums.

Before the debate, the air was quite different from the respective crowds:

Evolution side -
People were openly criticizing the selection of Bill Nye, as they often felt he lacks suitable credentials. They also were acting astonished that anyone would "stoop" to the level of actually debating creationinsm, thereby lending credibility to the argument.

Creation side -
People in these circles were almost antsy to see a Creationist "tear up" an evolutionist with facts and statements from the Bible. It was as if they thought the win was theirs before the opening bell.


As for the debate:

Evolution Side -
Bill Nye really surprised me with his stage presence. It is one thing to perform in front of a camera for a taped show, with multiple takes and directors, etc. It is quite a different thing to speak in front of hundreds (thousands?) present at the Creation Museum and potentially millions watching live around the world via internet stream. He did not seem uneasy, and he used as simple of terms as possible - bringing the subjects to life.

Creation Side -
Ken Ham similarly seemed at ease. It would be my guess that he speaks regularly in front of hundreds of people who come to his Creation Museum. It was clearly his home court. He presented his side of things and added the dimension of what he feels, as well as doing a good job of staying on point with "there's this book."

Snarky Bits - both
Neither man poked personal jabs at the other... much different than a political debate. This was refreshing.
Nye kept pointing to "Ham's personal interpretation of a book written thousands of years ago in other languages and translated into modern English." To be fair, the point was valid, though many others share Ham's opinion on the topic.
Ham kept pointing to the fact that evolution cannot tell us where or how life originated (Nye later confirmed), and would poke at the "chance" happenings needed to make it work.

Nye pointed to facts (speed of light and distance to stars, rubidium-strontium and uranium-lead decay), and commonly held theories (ice layer formation) to point to evidence of vast periods of time.
Ham only gave cursory counters to the commonly-held timeframes, but then seemed to quickly shift to other topics.

Nye constantly attacked the presumption of 4000 years since a flood, and pointed out a lack of evidence for same. It was my impression that Ham never fully addressed this issue.

At several instances, Nye openly challenged anyone to show evidence to the contrary that fossils were always found in predicted layers underground, and never mixed. I am surprised Ham did not mention Glen Rose, TX.

Ham did bring up a few notes that can demonstrate inconsistency in geological dating, to which Nye's responses were a bit lacking.

Ham brought up Biblical references to "kinds" - or what we now classify (typically) as "Family." It was interesting and showed how god helped us to classify things long ago. 

Nye completely failed to ask questions about Biblical writing - specifically the fact that much of the Bible is in allegory form (often taking the form of a parable). However, he only praised religion in broad terms. This was a positive note for me, as he shied away from the attacks that militant atheists often use in debates.

Ham seemed to reach his Achilles Heel with the subject of universal expansion. I'm not sure if he simply wasn't well read on the subject, or if he outright denies the evidence. With other commonly held notions, you could tell his stance (denies evidence or has an alternate explanation)... not with the expansion notion.

Ham also directly avoided mentioning factual constants like the speed of light and how that directly relates to time. To be fair, this was probably for the best with regards to his cause.

Conspicuous by its absence was discussion on the origin of man, specifically. 


Summary
I'm sure others will point out many things I didn't. That's fine... these are my takeaways on it. I enjoyed the debate. I felt the following victories were had by each side:
Evolution: age of Earth / Universe
Evolution: variations within species
Creation: origin of Earth
Creation: origin of life (including man)
Evolution: use of scientific method and observation of facts.
Creation: the fact that facts of the past must often be "interpreted" and this can be source of error.

In very broad terms, I'd imagine this outline sums up the personal beliefs of most Christians in America today, myself included.


Personal Feelings
Some time back, I set out to find what Jews felt on the age of the Earth. Reason being, as a chemist by training, I am extremely familiar with rubidium-strontium and uranium-lead decay, as well as other forms of radiometric dating. I also understand that the speed of light is a constant, and can, therefore, be used to measure distance.

If we can view stars that are millions of light-years away, then it means that something was around millions of years ago. Similarly, if we can determine the date of a rock to be millions, or even billions of years old, then we know Earth was here back then.

I refused to accept the strong evidence, and had to make sure my faith was right. It was not a matter of molding my faith, but a matter of interpreting a 3500 year old book correctly... something we cannot do with the same accuracy we can use to date a rock or measure distance to a star.


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