Kent Hovind, a former high school science teacher turned creation science evangelist, said that evolution is the "dumbest and most dangerous theory on planet Earth" at a program in the Union on Dec. 6.
Posted on 12/17/2005 3:58:48 AM PST by PatrickHenry
A former high school science teacher turned creation science evangelist told an audience at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee last Tuesday that evolution is the “dumbest and most dangerous theory on planet Earth.”
Kent Hovind, founder of Creation Science Evangelism, presented “Creation or Evolution … Which Has More Merit?” to a standing-room only audience in the Union Ballroom on Dec. 6. The event was sponsored by the Apologetics Association, the organization that brought Baptist minister Tim Wilkins to UWM to speak about homosexuality in October.
Members of the Apologetics Association (AA) contacted biology, chemistry and geology professors at UWM and throughout the UW System, inviting them to debate Hovind for an honorarium of $200 to be provided to the individual or group of individuals who agreed.
Before the event began, the “No-Debater List,” which was comprised of slides listing the names of UWM science professors who declined the invitation, was projected behind the stage.
Dustin Wales, AA president, said it was his “biggest disappointment” that no professor agreed to debate Hovind.
“No professor wanted to defend his side,” he said. “I mean, we had seats reserved for their people … ’cause I know one objection could have been ‘Oh, it’s just a bunch of Christians.’ So we had seats reserved for them to bring people to make sure that it’s somewhat more equal, not just all against one. And still nobody would do it.”
Biology professor Andrew Petto said: “It is a pernicious lie that the Apologetics (Association) is spreading that no one responded to the challenge. Many of us (professors) did respond to the challenge; what we responded was, ‘No, thank you.’ ”
Petto, who has attended three of Hovind’s “performances,” said that because Hovind presents “misinterpretations, half truths and outright lies,” professors at UWM decided not to accept his invitation to a debate.
“In a nutshell, debates like this do not settle issues of scientific understanding,” he said. “Hovind and his arguments are not even in the same galaxy as legitimate scientific discourse. This is why the faculty here has universally decided not to engage Hovind. The result would be to give the appearance of a controversy where none exists.”
He added, “The faculty on campus is under no obligation to waste its time supporting Hovind’s little charade.”
Hovind, however, is used to being turned down. Near the end of his speech, he said, “Over 3,000 professors have refused to debate me. Why? Because I’m not afraid of them.”
Hovind began his multimedia presentation by asserting that evolution is the “dumbest and most dangerous” theory used in the scientific community, but that he is not opposed to science.
“Our ministry is not against science, but against using lies to prove things,” he said. He followed this statement by citing biblical references to lies, which were projected onto screens behind him.
Hovind said: “I am not trying to get evolution out of schools or to get creation in. We are trying to get lies out of textbooks.” He added that if removing “lies” from textbooks leaves no evidence for evolutionists’ theory, then they should “get a new theory.”
He cited numerous state statutes that require that textbooks be accurate and up-to-date, but said these laws are clearly not enforced because the textbooks are filled with lies and are being taught to students.
Petto said it is inevitable that textbooks will contain some errors.
“Sometimes, this is an oversight. Sometimes it is the result of the editorial and revision process. Sometimes it is the result of trying to portray a rich and complex idea in a very few words,” he said.
The first “lie” Hovind presented concerned the formation of the Grand Canyon. He said that two people can look at the canyon. The person who believes in evolution would say, “Wow, look what the Colorado River did for millions and millions of years.” The “Bible-believing Christian” would say, “Wow, look what the flood did in about 30 minutes.”
To elaborate, Hovind discussed the geologic column — the chronologic arrangement of rock from oldest to youngest in which boundaries between different eras are marked by a change in the fossil record. He explained that it does not take millions of years to form layers of sedimentary rock.
“You can get a jar of mud out of your yard, put some water in it, shake it up, set it down, and it will settle out into layers for you,” he said. Hovind used this concept of hydrologic sorting to argue that the biblical flood is what was responsible for the formation of the Grand Canyon’s layers of sedimentary rock.
Hovind also criticized the concept of “micro-evolution,” or evolution on a small, species-level scale. He said that micro-evolution is, in fact, scientific, observable and testable. But, he said, it is also scriptural, as the Bible says, “They bring forth after his kind.”
Therefore, according to the Bible and micro-evolution, dogs produce a variety of dogs and they all have a common ancestor — a dog.
Hovind said, however, Charles Darwin made a “giant leap of faith and logic” from observing micro-evolution into believing in macro-evolution, or evolution above the species level. Hovind said that according to macro-evolution, birds and bananas are related if one goes back far enough in time, and “the ancestor ultimately was a rock.”
He concluded his speech by encouraging students to personally remove the lies from their textbooks and parents to lobby their school board for accurate textbooks.
“Tear that page out of your book,” he said. “Would you leave that in there just to lie to the kids?”
Petto said Hovind believes the information in textbooks to be “lies” because his determination is grounded in faith, not science.
“Make no mistake, this is not a determination made on the scientific evidence, but one in which he has decided on the basis of faith alone that the Bible is correct, and if the Bible is correct, then science must be wrong,” he said.
Petto said Hovind misinterprets scientific information and then argues against his misinterpretation.
“That is, of course, known as the ‘straw man’ argument — great debating strategy, but nothing to do with what scientists actually say or do,” he said. “The bottom line here is that the science is irrelevant to his conclusions.”
Another criticism of Hovind’s presentation is his citation of pre-college textbooks. Following the event, an audience member said, “I don’t think using examples of grade school and high school biology can stand up to evolution.”
Petto called this an “interesting and effective rhetorical strategy” and explained that Hovind is not arguing against science, but the “textbook version” of science.
“The texts are not presenting the research results of the scientific community per se, but digesting and paraphrasing it in a way to make it more effective in learning science,” he said. “So, what (Hovind) is complaining about is not what science says, but what the textbooks say that science says.”
Petto said this abbreviated version of scientific research is due, in part, to the editorial and production processes, which impose specific limits on what is included.
He added that grade school and high school textbooks tend to contain very general information about evolution and pressure from anti-evolutionists has weakened evolutionary discussion in textbooks.
“Lower-level texts … tend to be more general in their discussions of evolution and speak more vaguely of ‘change over time’ and adaptation and so on,” he said. “Due to pressure by anti-evolutionists, textbook publishers tend to shy away from being ‘too evolutionary’ in their texts … The more pressure there is on schools and publishers, the weaker the evolution gets, and the weaker it gets, the more likely that it will not do a good job of representing the current consensus among biologists.”
Hovind has a “standing offer” of $250,000 for “anyone who can give any empirical evidence (scientific proof) for evolution.” According to Hovind’s Web site, the offer “demonstrates that the hypothesis of evolution is nothing more than a religious belief.”
The Web site, www.drdino.com, says, “Persons wishing to collect the $250,000 may submit their evidence in writing or schedule time for a public presentation. A committee of trained scientists will provide peer review of the evidence offered and, to the best of their ability, will be fair and honest in their evaluation and judgment as to the validity of the evidence presented.”
Wales said the AA’s goal in bringing Hovind to UWM was “to crack the issue on campus” and bring attention to the fallibility of evolution.
“The ultimate goal was to say that, ‘Gosh, evolution isn’t as concrete as you say it is, and why do you get to teach everyone this non-concrete thing and then not defend it when someone comes and says your wrong?’ ” he said. “It’s just absurd.”
The anti-evos have really shown their true natures tonite, and its really been quite enlightening...
I like to be thorough.
of mostly extracted copied and modified rubbish.
You sort of "forgot" to document this slur.
Notice how much a creationist is able to actually refute one of my posts -- the answer is "not at all".
I know what you mean...I will recognize a couple of the regular religion posters who will pop onto an evo thread, and critize the tone...and I have to think to myself, what in the world are they talking about...its worse and nastier on most religious threads than any evo thread...which is why I often have to take a break from the religious threads...it just gets too nasty over there...I know that number of religious posters have gotten banned, because they got so ugly...all in the name of Christianity...its no wonder, that Christianity is fragmented, as I said in a previous post...it does not take evolution to fragment Christianity, all it takes is a roomful of 'Christians from varying religions' to fragment Christianity...
Clue for the clueless: The *majority* of Americans who accept the validity of evolution are *Christians*. As far as I can tell, so are most Freeper evolutionists, although I haven't polled them.
Clue for the clueless #2: Over 10,000 Christian clergy have signed a statement clearly endorsing evolutionary biology:
[Excerpt:] "We the undersigned, Christian clergy from many different traditions, believe that the timeless truths of the Bible and the discoveries of modern science may comfortably coexist. We believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny and upon which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this truth or to treat it as “one theory among others” is to deliberately embrace scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance to our children. We believe that among God’s good gifts are human minds capable of critical thought and that the failure to fully employ this gift is a rejection of the will of our Creator. To argue that God’s loving plan of salvation for humanity precludes the full employment of the God-given faculty of reason is to attempt to limit God, an act of hubris. We urge school board members to preserve the integrity of the science curriculum by affirming the teaching of the theory of evolution as a core component of human knowledge."
Seriously. And yet *we're* the ones "destroying" religion and Christianity. Spend much time lurking in there, and you realize pretty quick that they really don't need any help for that. ;)
LOL! You really shouldn't bait the creationists like that. With their mythological deity they do think they can lie their way into heaven.
Yeah, so? That in no way affects my point, or ameliorates Hovind's dishonesty (and loon-ness) apparent in the portions of the court document I posted. And I fail to see how my "decency" has anything to do with your non sequiter either. I didn't "have the decency" to post Hovind's shoe size or favorite cereal, either, and those are equally irrelevant to my post.
Try to focus and stay on topic, okay?
I refer to the last lines of what you posted in your post #864...about the attempt to limit God....this is what I have felt to be very true about creationists...they want God to conform to the very narrow rigid view they have of Him, and will accept nothing else...I see it as trying to put God into a little box, and demanding that He conform to a preconceived notion of what some human demands that He is...
I find God to be much more powerful, much more magnificient, much more creative, than any human can ever imagine Him to be...
Lies! Lies! Lies! Lies!
The vast majority of evolutionists are atheists. Their ultimate intent is the destruction of Christianity and the culture it gave rise to. Of course there are also a few brainwashed Christians who believe in this evolution nonsense. But anyone who professes to be a Christian and a follower of Darwinism is affected by doublethink, or the concept of holding two contradictory ideas in one's mind and accepting both of them at the same time.
Here is a post I wrote a while back listing over 160 branches of Christianity. I doubt that evolutionary biology had the power to fragment Christianity that much...
You're too naive, andysandmikesmom, if you cannot see what's happening. Either that or your station in life is fine and dandy. But remember this: someday your future progeny will damn you for the future you would have left them.
Our God is powerful enough to create evolution. Your God is so puny he mixed radioactive isotopes in exactly the right quantities to make it look like a 6000 year old earth was really 4.5 billion years old. Whose faith is stronger?
Try understanding what the "garbage" of evolution is actually saying. You will learn that it does not contradict God in any way. All it contradicts is the literal description of creation in the Bible, but the creation stories of Genesis already contradict themselves. They cannot both be literally true.
What a masterful rebuttal. Oh, wait, no it's not...
The vast majority of evolutionists are atheists.
A wise man once said, "never argue with a fool, bet him money". Would you care to bet twenty bucks on that claim, as it relates to American evolutionists?
Their ultimate intent is the destruction of Christianity and the culture it gave rise to. Of course there are also a few brainwashed Christians who believe in this evolution nonsense.
Over 10,000 Christian clergy, in fact. How many can *you* get to sign *your* version?
But anyone who professes to be a Christian and a follower of Darwinism is affected by doublethink, or the concept of holding two contradictory ideas in one's mind and accepting both of them at the same time.
10,000+ Christian clergy disagree with you on that. I think I'll take their considered opinion over yours.
I often get a rude shock on those religious threads...I almost never post, just lurk...but I often do wonder, do any of these posters on the religious threads step back and take an objective look at what goes on there?...I know that a lot of them are now familiar with each other, as much as one can be on the internet...but do they ever consider the lurkers, who might be there to perhaps learn and educate themselves?...all the lurkers can see for themselves, how vile and ugly it gets on those religious threads, and they must honestly wonder what is going on...I know I did for a long time...now I am just used to the bickering...but I suppose new lurkers just get a rude awakening, for what they thought would be a religious conversation, often turns into a nasty free for all...
I agree with him.
And I graduated first in my college class with a 4.0 GPA and am an ex-evolutionist.
It just astounds me that people could believe such a transparently idiotic theory as evolution. Monkeys become people. Right.
There is an encyclopedia of religions in America that lists over 1500 Christian sects and denominations in the US - I forget the name, but I'll look it up some time. Obviously, some of that depends on how you define "sect" or "denomination", but still...
You speak to me on NO authority...all you have is your own self serving view of the world, and the Bible, and God, and if I dont agree with you, then I am naive, and I will be damned? You have NO authority to decide this, and you should stick to worrying about your own future fate...
That's probably the worst aspect of it, IMO - watching them strip the flesh from some clueless newbie.
You are absolutely right.
I am an ex-evolutionists turned Christian. Evolution is an idiot theory designed to disprove the Bible. Those who claim to to be Christians and believe in evolution are deceived. This is typical of the compromise predicted in God's Word in the end times within the Christian Church.
"10,000+ Christian clergy disagree with you on that."
I don't know where you got that number, but what is that, .01%? The vast majority of these prelates that believe in evolution are infiltrators. The minuscule remainder are, like some Christian lay people, just braiwashed or naive or both.
There are three kinds of people in this world. Those who make things happen; those who watch make things happen; and, those who ask: "What happened?" Christian evolutionists are of this latter category.
On we go Christian army! An invisible, yet invincible one!
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