Posted on 01/14/2007 5:31:07 PM PST by Tim Long
PETERSBURG, Kentucky - Ken Ham's sprawling creation museum isn't even open yet, but an expansion is already underway in the state-of-the art lobby, where grunting dinosaurs and animatronic humans coexist in a Biblical paradise.
A crush of media attention and packed preview sessions have convinced Ham that nearly half a million people a year will come to Kentucky to see his Biblically correct version of history.
"I think we'll be surprised at how many people come," Ham said as he dodged dozens of designers working to finish exhibits in time for the May 28 opening.
The $27 million project, which also includes a planetarium, a special-effects theater, nature trails and a small lake, is privately funded by people who believe the Bible's first book, Genesis, is literally true.
For them, a museum showing Christian schoolchildren and skeptics alike how the earth, animals, dinosaurs and humans were created in a six-day period about 6,000 years ago -- not over millions of years, as evolutionary science says -- is long overdue.
While foreign media and science critics have mostly come to snigger at exhibits explaining how baby dinosaurs fit on Noah's Ark and Cain married his sister to people the earth, museum spokesman and vice-president Mark Looy said the coverage has done nothing but drum up more interest.
"Mocking publicity is free publicity," Looy said. Besides, U.S. media have been more respectful, mindful perhaps of a 2006 Gallup Poll showing 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.
Looy said supporters of the museum include evangelical Christians, Orthodox Jews and conservative Catholics, as well as the local Republican congressman, Geoff Davis (news, bio, voting record), and his family, who have toured the site.
FROM 'JAWS' TO EDEN
While the debate between creationists and mainstream scientists has bubbled up periodically in U.S. schools since before the Scopes "monkey trial" in nearby Tennessee 80 years ago, courts have repeatedly ruled that teaching religious theory in public schools is unconstitutional.
Ham, an Australian who moved to America 20 years ago, believes creationists could have presented a better case at the Scopes trail if they'd been better educated -- but he's not among those pushing for creation to be taught in school.
Rather than force skeptical teachers to debate creation, Ham wants kids to come to his museum, where impassioned experts can make their case that apparently ancient fossils and the Grand Canyon were created just a few thousand years ago in a great flood.
"It's not hitting them over the head with a Bible, it's just teaching that we can defend what it says," he said.
Ham, who also runs a Christian broadcasting and publishing venture, said the museum's Hollywood-quality exhibits set the project apart from the many quirky Creation museums sprinkled across America.
The museum's team of Christian designers include theme park art director Patrick Marsh, who designed the "Jaws" and "King Kong" attractions at Universal Studios in Florida, as well as dozens of young artists whose conviction drives their work.
"I think it shows (nonbelievers) the other side of things," said Carolyn Manto, 27, pausing in her work painting Ice Age figures for a display about caves in France.
"I don't think it's going to be forcing any viewpoint on them, but challenging them to think critically about their evolutionary views," said Manto, who studied classical sculpture before joining the museum.
Still, Looy is upfront about the museum's mission: to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with nonbelievers.
"I think a lot of people are going to come out of curiosity ... and we're going to present the Gospel. This is going to be an evangelistic center," Looy said. A chaplain has been hired for museum-goers in need of spiritual guidance.
The museum's rural location near the border of Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana places it well within America's mostly conservative and Christian heartland. But the setting has another strategic purpose: two-thirds of Americans are within a day's drive of the site, and Cincinnati's international airport is minutes away.
The project has not been without opposition. Zoning battles with environmentalists and groups opposed to the museum's message have delayed construction and the museum's opening day has been delayed repeatedly.
The museum has hired extra security and explosives-sniffing dogs to counter anonymous threats of damage to the building. "We've had some opposition," Looy said.
I don't know what you wrote about the dna code is accurate. Sure doesn't sound like it. But it doesn't negate the amazing responsibility the code has in our bodies. It is far more intricate than a computer code. I mean, it's putting in motion the nano factory that is our cells and bodies. If you really look into it it is amazing and is obviously designed by an intelligence.
The cambrian explosion was basically the earliest period ever found where species 'began' en mass- before that period, you have basically nothing, and certainly no transitional species- there's plenty on the net explaining the explosion-
Sure- the protections are built in to the cells- they prevent foreign info from tainting the species info- there are several layers of these protections which ensure that species will always remain within their own kind- this is what prevents breeders from breeding cats and dogs together- or anyhting outside of it's own kind- we find htese celular protections going all the way back to the cambrian age-
yes I did...your just listening to your darkside again. The amazing responsibility of the dna code and that it is more complex in function than a computer code is a fact. You would never say that your computer code could make itself naturally.
he knows that fabian- but in order for him to admit that- he would have to admit that what they find is indeed fact and that it contradicts his reeligion of evolution- be prepared for many such blinders-on accusations from the evolution crowd-
nah- I aint doing all your research for you- You can google it just as well as I can- either that or shout "Nope- yuou didn't provide a link- not gonna beleive you'- whatever- the facts are there.
It's customary for the person making the claim to back it up. Otherwise he or she looks like an ignorant blowhard.
False. Radiocarbon depends on the half-life of C-14; by the time you get to 50,000 years, the signal to noise ratio makes normal techniques inadequate. (There are a few labs experimenting with better methods which may permit analysis of older samples, but those are not commonly used.)
Archaeologists know this, and take it into account. "Evos" don't often use radiocarbon dating. They use other forms of radiometric dating that are suitable for older specimens and specimens that contain no carbon.
Please read the links I provided upthread.
snigger al lyou like- but there is ancient pottery showing depictions of dinos that science is just now learning about as to how certain dinos acted and walked- pottery showing even the domestication of some dinos- now- either the ancients were far more advanced than our scientists, or they saw first hand what the dinos did
Thank you for your moral support! I'm glad I'm not the only person who sees the unGodliness of Creationists.
it's also customary of those who provide links disputing the evidence to have their links totally discounted because they might have the word God in them- think what you want- I've been in far too many of these arguments to care what folks do or don't do- the results of these threads always foolows the same patterns of denial
all of which have hteir own problems as I hspowed in the links I provided- and all throwing out evidences that contradict their preconceived ideas- Carbon dating is not accurate even to 50,000 as I said due to events unknown to those doing hte testing- As I stated- previous notions of coal and subsequent tersting showed it to supposedly be millions of years old- the fact is that catastrophic events throw that whole concept on it's head
you bring up a good point- people point to how 'similiar' we are to chimps- but what they NEVER tell you is how vastly dissimiliar we are- billions of times dissimiliar when it comes to the code between the two species.
Yes they are wrong.
You can't support the claim that it is older than 6000 years with carbon dating so we are both working on faith.
So you won't provide any evidence because you don't have any confidence in the evidence you have to stand up to scrutiny? Makes sense. If I were in as untenable a position I might refrain from showing my cards too.
I think we should make YEC part of the Republican platform for '08. This should really energize the social conservative base and ensure we achieve a landslide victory.
(what's even more frightening are the people who'd actually support/believe that)
Yes they are wrong.
You can't support the claim that it is older than 6000 years with carbon dating so we are both working on faith.
Sorry, that happens not to be the case.
You are doing apologetics (defense of religion), while I am doing science. Religious claims and other things supernatural require faith as they cannot be independently verified.
Science does not require faith because it is based on facts and theory. When a scientific theory has a long history of being supported by verifiable evidence, it is appropriate to speak about "acceptance" of (not "belief" in) the theory; or we can say that we have "confidence" (not "faith") in the theory. It is the dependence on verifiable data and the capability of testing that distinguish scientific theories from matters of faith.
Science finds no evidence to support a 6000 year old earth, while there is a mass of evidence supporting an old earth.
What I really see is that you have never seriously read many, if any, ordinary textbooks on paleontology or natural history because you have little sincere curiosity as to the way God's world works, that you are blinded by your pride which you tell yourself is "faith." In truth, your faith is so weak that worldly scienfic physical truths threaten your belief in God.
You must also think Jesus was a liar because he told his followers to remove the mote, log, or splinter from their own eyes before judging others, when you and I and any other thinking person knows that any of those three items in a person's eye would probably be a mortal injury -- parables are okay in some parts of the bible, but not in Genesis?
You are allowing yourself to be a tool of evil because of pride. You really need to do some serious READING in a spirit of humbleness, plain old science TEXTBOOKS; acknowledge the difference between scientific findings and scientists who declare that they "prove" the absence of God (two very different items that Creationists CANNOT SEEM TO GET THROUGH THEIR STUBBORN HEADS); and also to do some serious soul-searching as to whether you really believe that either:
A) your fellow man and often religious scientiests are so wantonly wicked that they've successfully engaged in blatant fraud for the past century OR
B) God plants false physical evidence.
lol- keep from showing them? They are FREELY avAIlable to you sir- I am not hiding anything- as I said- look them up if you're interested- don't if you don't want to discover them- choice is yours- As I said- I'm not spending all day as you or anyone elses errand boy because as I said- it amounts to a hill of beans because as soon as I do give them- there will be one of two thiongs happen- denail because the article contains the word God- (denial plus copious amounts of ridicule and insults thrown in) or two- the person will ignore the facts and simply move on to the next rabbit trail as though the evidences agaisnt what they stated were of no consequence.
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