A Monument To Creation: Kentucky Museum Discounts Centuries Of Research, Critics Say
New museum says dinosaurs were on Noah’s Ark
PETERSBURG, Ky (Reuters) - Like many modern museums, the newest U.S. tourist attraction includes some awesome exhibits — roaring dinosaurs and a life-sized ship. But only at the Creation Museum in Kentucky do the dinosaurs sail on the ship — Noah’s Ark, to be precise. The Christian creators of the sprawling museum, unveiled on Saturday, hope to draw as many as half a million people each year to their state-of-the-art project, which depicts the Bible’s first book, Genesis, as literal truth. While the $27 million museum near Cincinnati has drawn snickers from media and condemnation from U.S. scientists, those who believe God created the heavens and the Earth in six days about 6,000 years ago say their views are finally being represented…. “What we’ve done here is to give people an opportunity to hear information that is not readily available … to challenge them that really you can believe the Bible’s history,” said Ken Ham, president of the group Answers in Genesis that founded the museum.
Well, who needs science when you have faith in God, eh? It’s a great (and probably dangerous) thing when you can blithely ignore several hundred years of empirical science simply because that knowledge doesn’t match your narrow religiosity. When the only book you need (or, indeed, ever read) is the Bible, what use would you have for science?
I can understand that some folks want to believe in something larger than themselves. I can even understand that some folks cling to their Christian faith as if it were some sort of moral and theological life preserver. What I cannot grasp is how some well-meaning and otherwise reasonably lucid individuals are willing to completely ignore hundreds of years of scientific investigation simply because it doesn’t match the Biblical account.
Then again, these are the some folks who voted for Our Glorious and Benevolent Leader © TWICE because he’s a “resolute man of God”. Right; and I’m the Queen of England. Where’s my (&^%$#@ tiara??
The truly sad thing is that most of these believers wear their ignorance and denial as if it were a badge of honor, as if ignoring hundreds of years of science is something to be proud of. The “God said it, I believe it, that settles it” attitude prevalent in so many born-again types is something truly disturbing to behold. At least now they have their own museum, where they can see the blind faith and ignorance re-affirmed.
But in this latest demonization of Darwinian evolution, there is a sticking point: For the biblical account to be accurate and the world to be so young, several hundred years of research in geology, physics, biology, paleontology, and astronomy would need to be very, very wrong.
“This may be fascinating, but this is nonsense,” said Lawrence M. Krauss, a theoretical physicist at Case Western Reserve University and a vocal defender of evolutionary science. “It’s fine for people to believe whatever they want. What’s inappropriate is to then essentially lie and say science supports these notions.”
Eugenie C. Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education, calls the sparkling facility “the creationist Disneyland.”
The ultimate goal of this museum seems to be to perpetuate the glorification of faith and bibilical “truth” over an overwhelming trove of empirical knowledge about evolution gathered over hundreds of years. Who needs science? We have the Bible, and everything we need to know is contained within. We no longer need to think, we merely react. If it’s not in the Bible, then it’s simply not something we need to know.
Scary, huh??
Yes, folks, this is how we end up with unreconstructed theocrats like The Worst President EVER © running this country as if it was their private playground? Separation of Church and State? Why bother, when you blend the Church into the State?
What Would Jesus DO?? Why, he’s bomb Iran….
Opponents argue that children who see the exhibits will be confused when they learn in school that the universe is 14 billion years old rather than 6,000.
“Teachers don’t deserve a student coming into class saying ‘Gee Mrs. Brown, I went to this fancy museum and it said you’re teaching me a lie,”’ Dr. Eugenie Scott, executive director of the National Center for Science Education, told reporters before the museum opened.
A Gallup poll last year showed almost half of Americans believe that humans did not evolve but were created by God in their present form within the last 10,000 years.
Three of 10 Republican presidential candidates said in a recent debate that they did not believe in evolution.
And if that last one doesn’t scare the Hell out of you, you ought to just turn in your voter’s registration card right now before you do any further damage to our democracy. And when you’re done, why not just go ahead and move to Idaho, ring your property with barbed wire and Claymore mines, and bury a school bus?
Amazing, isn’t it? Someone spent $27 million to celebrate ignorance, reaction, and the death of intellectual activity. What’s even worse is that three Republican Presidential candidates have cast their lot with these knuckle-draggers.
Who needs truth? We have the Bible….
