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Friday, February 07, 2014

Creationist scientists and bottoms of barrels

One of the interesting quirks of creationists is their intense desire to gain credibility by finding religious scientists who agree with them about god(s) and creation. We saw a good example in the Ken Ham vs Bill Nye debate where Ken Ham managed to find several people who are Young Earth Creationists but nevertheless made a contribution to science or technology. Some were physicians and some were engineers but some were actually scientists [see the debate at: Bill Nye Debates Ken Ham].

I'm reminded of a passage in The God Delusion (p. 100) where Richard Dawkins says ...
The efforts of apologists to find genuinely distinguished modern scientists who are religious have an air of desperation, generating the unmistakably hollow sound or bottoms of barrels being scraped.
Dawkins goes on to point out that efforts to find creationist Nobel Prize winners in Physics, Chemistry, or Physiology & Medicine have been largely unsuccessful.


4 comments :

Sean Boyle said...

One thing I noticed is that the only biologist he featured was a grad student from Liberty University, Falwell's little haven of creationism

Robert Byers said...

Oh no. Your side fires first on Fort Sumpter
Creationists are attacked, as in the great debate,as being anti science! A lame and absurd claim.
So we have too, just as dumbly, mention a list.
There are millions of YEC scientists now and in the past. who in the world is counting except for me?
The Nobel prize is a minor recognition of a few people marginally ahead of a few more.
Chemistry is trivial and physics over rated as relevant.
biology is the most intellectually demanding subject. Its not trivial.
Once again head counting is invoked to justify what should be justified by the evidence.
What do physics etc people know about evolution more then plumbers?
As the debate showed evolutionism etc can't make a good case.
The end is near now that more people pay attention to ideas formerly studied in obscure circles.

SRM said...

There are millions of YEC scientists now and in the past. who in the world is counting except for me?

I suspect your counting is a tad off. But you don't mean YEC scientists, but rather scientists, esp in the past, who would have found it normal to believe in every word of the bible even while detecting no evidence for it in the natural world.

The end is near now that more people pay attention to ideas formerly studied in obscure circles.

As always, you are wonderfully optimistic. What I fear is a world that will come to be after some sort of natural or human-made calamity...probably then we will indeed return full-throttle to a superstitious dark age, and your prophecy will come to pass.

Diogenes said...

I feel like expressing myself now. And I could certainly use a RELEASE!

To be viewed while reading aloud the poem below

"The Nobel Prize Is a Minor Recognition"
By Robert Byers.

Oh no. Your side fires first
on Fort Sumpter

Creationists are attacked, as in the great debate, as being
anti science! A lame and absurd claim.

So we have too, just as dumbly, mention a list.

There are millions of YEC scientists
now and in the past.
who in the world is counting
except for me?

The Nobel prize is a minor recognition
of a few people
marginally ahead
of a few more.

Chemistry is trivial
and physics over rated
as relevant.

biology
is the most intellectually
demanding subject.
Its not trivial.

Once again head counting
is invoked to justify
what should be justified
by the evidence.

What do physics etc people know
about evolution
more then plumbers?