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.
Understood.
Delta Sierra out.
Sweet dreams, KP!
Hey KP - I steer well clear of the Crevo threads -- IMO they are not winnable arguments. Both sides take faith to believe -- it just depends where you wish to focus your faith. I know what I believe, and where my faith is.
:-)
Somehow, I knew you were wandering...
Thank you.
Over multiple threads. The initial Undead Thread established that the Last Post ("The End of the Internet") one can make on any particular thread is post #65534 (hexadecimal X'FFFE'). You can see it here
Amusing that FR reports it as 65544...
May I recommend chocolate-chunk brownies, vanilla ice cream, and coffee? Followed by a good night's sleep?
(Sorry, just wishful thinking ...)
Don't get yourself zotted over this tizzy - you'll never get to see the pictures of my new cat!
Yeah, that *pool* of knowledge is out there and is open to anyone. Astronomers and biologists can both access it. So how do astronomers and biologists having different areas of expertise fit into that?
Dave never said ichneumon plagerized. His comment was about copy and paste. His other comment about plagerism was seperate and didn't reference ichneumon at all; it was a seperate paragraph. What a stretch to make accusations like that about Dave. What can we say about libel in your case in accusing Dave of that?
It's that immortal brigadier wreath thingie over at DC.
You know, the special honor for getting banned from FR allegedly for being pro-science instead of violating the posting guidelines, but they're handing them out like candy. Seems like anyone can get one for any reason now.
The one thing that fundamentalists can't seem to grasp is that a superficial human understanding of the processes God uses to make his creations successful in a dynamic environment doesn't make them less miraculous.
I scanned the smoldering landscape of this thread and couldn't immediately see if anyone had actually provided additional info regarding the original topic. Here is a walkthrough of the museum:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/museum/walkthrough/
being 'pro-science"? All i've seen is an aversion to addressing the issues being discussed, petty name calling, and attempts to derail the thread- if that's being 'pro-science' by them- then it's a VERY shallow victory for them indeed.
Well, yeah, but *pro-science* and *anti-science* were the terms they use and reasons they give. Not my idea.
Hey, you want to see an example of shallowness and what science is descending to, check out this thread...
Study: Infants Think Like Apes Until They're Three Years Old (We Used to be Apes Alert!
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1768927/posts
The Bible is not evidence.
When engaged in a purely logical debate, comitting a fallacy such as attacking the source is indeed an error, however, when engaged in a scientific discussion, the source of one's information is an entirely valid thing to call into question. Especially when one considers that for each and every point raised on the AiG website, there are refutations available to be found. If you wish, I could go point-by-point through the articles you listed.
"This is a categorically false statement. State the line number in the transcript that you have interpreted to render this lie."
Here is the appropriate excerpt from the Judge's decision:
Creation science as defined in Section 4(a), not only fails to follow the canons of dealing with scientific theory, it also fails to fit the more general descriptions of "what scientists think" and "what scientists do." The scientific community consists of individuals and groups, nationally and internationally, who work independently in such varied fields as biology, paleontology, geology, and astronomy. Their work is published and subject to review and testing by their peers. The journals for publication are both numerous and varied. There is, however, not one recognized scientific journal which has published an article espousing the creation science theory described in Section 4(a). Some of the State's witnesses suggested that the scientific community was "close-minded" on the subject of creationism and that explained the lack of acceptance of the creation science arguments. Yet no witness produced a scientific article for which publication has been refused. Perhaps some members of the scientific community are resistant to new ideas. It is, however, inconceivable that such a loose knit group of independent thinkers in all the varied fields of science could, or would, so effectively censor new scientific thought.
Oh, dear: A Pepsi Challenge. Okay, metmom, I'll humor you:
1. no, DLR did not in fact say "ichneumon plagerized"
2. he did, however, say ichneumon plagIArized
3. that this can be proven by sentence deconstruction any competent fourth-grader should comprehend:
a)"that" in "There's been constant links posted to refute that interpretation" refers to the preceding sentence in the preceding paragraph - "That game of evolutionary connect-the-dots, that comical and oft-refuted diatribe of ill-conceived interpretation, that paper chain consisting of massive leaps of faith and logic over chasms of scientific impossibility?"
b)similarly, "the vast amounts of plagiarized material" in the terminal sentence quoted also refers to "that interpretation" and "That game of evolutionary connect-the-dots, that comical and oft-refuted diatribe of ill-conceived interpretation, that paper chain consisting of massive leaps of faith and logic over chasms of scientific impossibility"
c) DLR specifically singled out ichneumon as the promulgator of the above-cited "that"
d) therefore, it is inescapable that DLR's statement set does indeed accuse ichneumon of plagiarism.
e) moreover, DLR goes on to give a "summary" of ichneumon's "game of evolutionary connect-the-dots, that comical and oft-refuted diatribe of ill-conceived interpretation, that paper chain consisting of massive leaps of faith and logic over chasms of scientific impossibility"
f) which renders his accusation of plagiarism not "seperate" -as you put it- but the bridge and glue between his first paragraph and the remainder of his post.
I will here gently suggest that one who (despite having dictionary entries included as references in the post to which she responds) cannot spell "plagiarized" -nor separate, for that matter- and who mistakes a denotative analysis of a linear string of accusatory statements for "a stretch" should be very hesitant to engage in a semantic game of hide-the-potato with me.
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