"Science Guy’ Bill Nye vs. Creationist Ken Ham: Who Will Win the Big Debate?

Well some Austrailians apologized for Ham.

Bill Nye Open Letter
An open letter to Bill Nye, the Science Guy

Dear Bill, Sunday 2nd Feb 2014

We’re sorry. We’re really sorry.

We know how you American rationalists think of us Aussies. You think we’re all so busy clinging on to the bottom of the world with our fingertips that we don’t have time to waste concerning ourselves with silly creationist ideas – that we’re a haven of straightforward logical thinking, secular education, free healthcare and good-looking half-clothed beach bunnies.

But we’re really sorry, Bill – Ken Ham is our fault, and it’s time we took responsibility for him. We, the people of Australia, have allowed our zealots to escape to your fair shores. It’s not just Ham, either. Fine specimens like Gary Bates, who left for the forgiving climes of Georgia, still manages to send his tentacled pods back over the Pacific and feed our kids rubbish about how the earth is only 6000 years old – a particular head-scratcher for our Indigenous population, whose families have been here since 50,000 BCE. I mean, talk about breathtakingly rude.

We’ve been slack, Bill. Our practically secular society let us get complacent; we didn’t notice years ago, when the scripture classes that had slid in sideways last century were commandeered by proselytising evangelicals who set about “making disciples” of our children. We let slide our government handing over of wads of tax dollars to create a raft of fundamentalist religious schools who teach kids the kind of hogwash that you will have to endure from Ken Ham in your debate. In fact, Bill, just this week, when Professor Marion Maddox nailed a copy of her exemplary new book Taking God To School to our doors, it was a stark reminder of just how much we’d let our secular-ish, sunburnt paradise go. And now, any attempt to reverse the process has been met with squealing about “our Christian heritage” from people who often don’t understand either Christianity OR heritage.

To our shame, decades of preoccupation with things like Olympic medal tallies and football players has made Australia into the “Typhoid Mary” of Creationism: we were rubbishing America for its anti-evolutionists and didn’t even notice that we were the ones exporting young-earth evangelism to your great nation, where unfortunately there is no tariff on craziness. We are so, so sorry.

So on Tuesday, when you’re roasting the Ham and his patently ridiculous ideas on the rotisserie of logic, tell him you’ve got a message from Australia. Tell him from us that we used his state-issued Akubra hat to cover a hole in the national chookhouse shed, that he is no longer entitled to use his formal Australian name (Kenno) and that he is now forbidden any Tim Tams – ever again. Also, that whenever his name comes up at Christmas, while we sit around drinking white wine in the sun, there will be a formal awkward silence of twenty to forty seconds, until someone brightly offers everyone pudding. And if you could manage to kick him in the shins and tell him and his ilk to leave our kids alone, Bill – we’d owe you one.

Best Regards,

Secular Coalition of Australia (SECOA)

SECOA

To me it looks more like Ken wants to pull all his hair, as he is just plain unable to hold on fairy tales he has build his religion upon. He finds comfort in rare scientist that are blind enough to believe in young earth even all evidence points otherwise, and it is just scary idea to have this presented to kids as equal to archeology, history or other theory of origin.

I did not expect Ken to give anything new, yet he managed to give me new meaning for words 'arrogance' and 'ignorance'. Well done!

And for those who speak about arrogance in science community - how many times Bill was hones and has said - I don't know, We don't know yet, but we are searching?! Add to that what he said about new evidence, and we know this is correct, from some of thesis just in recent years that have changed what we knew about history (we have Neanderthal and Denisovan genes, Dogs and Wolves sharing common ancestor, new archeological discoveries,...) that science is always open for new discoveries, done properly.

Well done Mr. Science Guy!

EDIT - I really love how Ken used - where you there? Somehow, he was not there, and trust someone else that book he holds dear was written by no other than God himself, with all its illogical and controversial statements, and at least we know he has 'fixed version'... Would love if Bill asked him - Ken, where you there when God wrote bible. Show evidence...

SuperFrog
To me it looks more like Ken wants to pull all his hair, as he is just plain unable to hold on fairy tales he has build his religion upon. He finds comfort in rare scientist that are blind enough to believe in young earth even all evidence points otherwise, and it is just scary idea to have this presented to kids as equal to archeology, history or other theory of origin.

I did not expect Ken to give anything new, yet he managed to give me new meaning for words 'arrogance' and 'ignorance'. Well done!

And for those who speak about arrogance in science community - how many times Bill was hones and has said - I don't know, We don't know yet, but we are searching?! Add to that what he said about new evidence, and we know this is correct, from some of thesis just in recent years that have changed what we knew about history (we have Neanderthal and Denisovan genes, Dogs and Wolves sharing common ancestor, new archeological discoveries,...) that science is always open for new discoveries, done properly.

Well done Mr. Science Guy!

Ken gave me a reason to contemplate suicide...

Anyway, I think the best part of the whole debate was Bill's ability to admit that we don't know things! This is the best part of science, in my opinion. Bill acknowledges human ignorance whereas Ken embraces it....

Hi, guys. I'm just watching it now - but some people are saying it's already over???

Confused.

I'm 48-ish minutes in.....



Oh well. No big. I'm getting a headache just listening, whether I'm "late" or not.

reply to post by FriedBabelBroccoli


Really??
You're funny.
I'm listening to Ham right now....so, shush. He's giving me a headache; a once in a lifetime experience.

Okay, my view on youtube is just Nye just now doing his 30-minute thing.....

sigh

never mind. Apparently we aren't all watching this simultaneously.


See you all tomorrow!

I only listened to Ham's part yet and all the long I taught...

Everything he says is totally irrelevant, what is he talking against of anyway?

All the time he babbles on the idea that evolutionism is a belief while totally dismissing that evolutionists constantly change and review their models according to new findings while creationists...well, their ideas are all based on one book.

Figure out who's relying more heavily on beliefs...

I thought Ham debated worse than what I have seen in some of the threads here. Constant circular reasoning and avoiding direct questions when it came to questions from the viewers in my opinion is he was done in when the question was asked of what evidence would it take to change your position. He pretty much said nothing would that demonstrates a completely closed mind. He wouldn't even answer it as a hypothetical. Bill gave at least 5 examples of what would change his mind and encouraged people to find and present that evidence.

It was at that point that Kenno Ham was crushed by his own reluctance to answer. I don't know why I expected more/better from Ham, but I am not surprised that that is all he offered.

OP you might find this debate more interesting. It is Hugh Ross vs Kent Hovind.

I watched the debate live and Bill Nye was awesome!!
I personally believe that there is a higher power that put everything into motion and then evolution took over from there.
Ken Ham was entertaining in the way he danced around answering questions, it reminded me of a politician. He was terrible at debating.

Besides factual provable evidence Bill Nye provided , when Ham admitted that nothing would ever change his mind in reference to creationsim he lost all credibility.

In other words he is not looking for the truth but rather in the pursuit of keeping his reality from collapsing even if its virtual.

Well done Mr. Nye.

reply to post by FriedBabelBroccoli

Congratulations! . . . You outsmarted a child . . .

Hes not a child... hes just brainwashed from a young age...

You do realize that wildtimes thinks people like your girlfriend are the source of most the world's pain through all history?

Do you realize I agree with that?

and its not her that is the problem, its the belief system shes associated with...

I am just curious how you deal with being involved with such ignorant people?

Tolerance... patience... a bit of charm...

and more knowledge of the book they worship then they possess

Ken Ham had a really fancy 30 min presentation that he clearly spent some time and money on. He ultimately floundered during the Q&A where Bill Nye danced circles around him.

ATSmediaPRO
Ken Ham had a really fancy 30 min presentation that he clearly spent some time and money on. He ultimately floundered during the Q&A where Bill Nye danced circles around him.

Bahaha, I was thinking the same thing watching this. Bills faces shows everything hes thinking inside. He looked like we was ready to just say, "F*ck it, where are the gloves, im ready to beat this dude down!"

My thoughts on the debate...

The whole thing was horribly put together... I imagine there was a purpose for that..

It was at their "museum" so I can only assume that was the reason they wouldn't let any rebuttal longer then one minute...

Its basically impossible to answer questions or even give a rebuttal to a question like the ones asked in a minute...

Ken Ham was a mess... Even resorting to lies such as "there is evidence of noahs flood" which anyone outside of their little group knows there isn't...

Notice when that little factoid came up on his screen the first thing he said was "now I can't give an answer to all of these issues but" and he skips right over the "evidence of the flood"... I noticed Bill was amused at that

Ken answered NO questions that bill asked... and used the one rule I personally thing should have been in place more times then I could count... that being "because the bible says so" is not a valid answer...

I admit I was expecting a bit of name calling, but that didn't happen... other then that Bill was clearly nervous but he was on top of the questions while ken ham was just a mess from the beginning...

There was no winner in this debate, because it wasn't a debate to begin with... it was a display of blind ignorance vs scientific theory

Wait I don't get it. Evolution has nothing to do with how life is created...

So Bill Nye won then. Excellent! Ham's a bloviating ignoramus. blog.seattlepi.com...

reply to post by Akragon


LOL, first thing came to my mind when I read your post last night - behind enemy lines.

Knowledge is power, and I find it very interesting when people get surprised when you ask them about some of details regarding their faith that mostly they overlook.

I was surprised at how many churches streamed last night debate, even young earth is not supported by many of them. One thing I wish they did - place question - Age of Earth 6K or 4.5 Billion and show results at end after they made the same questionnaire again. Something like this was done in "The Catholic Church is a force for good in the world" debate where Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry opposed Archbishop Onaiyekan (of Abuja, Nigeria) and Ann Widdecombe.



Not that last night crowed was open for persuasion based on rationale and reason, but it would be interesting to see if there are any changes.

reply to post by SullivanBlack



Kens not an academic or trained scientist anyway is he? The creationist have some of them but even the christians are afraid of them. LOL

Logarock
reply to post by SullivanBlack

 

Kens not an academic or trained scientist anyway is he? The creationist have some of them but even the christians are afraid of them. LOL

Nope, he just waved his bible around a lot. It was a bit one-sided.