Posted on 01/02/2005 12:20:11 PM PST by PatrickHenry
With its towering dinosaurs and a model of the Grand Canyon, America's newest tourist attraction might look like the ideal destination for fans of the film Jurassic Park.
The new multi-million-dollar Museum of Creation, which will open this spring in Kentucky, will, however, be aimed not at film buffs, but at the growing ranks of fundamentalist Christians in the United States.
It aims to promote the view that man was created in his present shape by God, as the Bible states, rather than by a Darwinian process of evolution, as scientists insist.
The centrepiece of the museum is a series of huge model dinosaurs, built by the former head of design at Universal Studios, which are portrayed as existing alongside man, contrary to received scientific opinion that they lived millions of years apart.
Other exhibits include images of Adam and Eve, a model of Noah's Ark and a planetarium demonstrating how God made the Earth in six days.
The museum, which has cost a mighty $25 million (£13 million) will be the world's first significant natural history collection devoted to creationist theory. It has been set up by Ken Ham, an Australian evangelist, who runs Answers in Genesis, one of America's most prominent creationist organisations. He said that his aim was to use tourism, and the theme park's striking exhibits, to convert more people to the view that the world and its creatures, including dinosaurs, were created by God 6,000 years ago.
"We want people to be confronted by the dinosaurs," said Mr Ham. "It's going to be a first class experience. Visitors are going to be hit by the professionalism of this place. It is not going to be done in an amateurish way. We are making a statement."
The museum's main building was completed recently, and work on the entrance exhibit starts this week. The first phase of the museum, which lies on a 47-acre site 10 miles from Cincinatti on the border of Kentucky and Ohio, will open in the spring.
Market research companies hired by the museum are predicting at least 300,000 visitors in the first year, who will pay $10 (£5.80) each.
Among the projects still to be finished is a reconstruction of the Grand Canyon, purportedly formed by the swirling waters of the Great Flood – where visitors will "gape" at the bones of dinosaurs that "hint of a terrible catastrophe", according to the museum's publicity.
Mr Ham is particularly proud of a planned reconstruction of the interior of Noah's Ark. "You will hear the water lapping, feel the Ark rocking and perhaps even hear people outside screaming," he said.
More controversial exhibits deal with diseases and famine, which are portrayed not as random disasters, but as the result of mankind's sin. Mr Ham's Answers in Genesis movement blames the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School in Colorado, in which two teenagers killed 12 classmates and a teacher before killing themselves, on evolutionist teaching, claiming that the perpetrators believed in Darwin's survival of the fittest.
Other exhibits in the museum will blame homosexuals for Aids. In a "Bible Authority Room" visitors are warned: "Everyone who rejects his history – including six-day creation and Noah's flood – is `wilfully' ignorant.''
Elsewhere, animated figures will be used to recreate the Garden of Eden, while in another room, visitors will see a tyrannosaurus rex pursuing Adam and Eve after their fall from grace. "That's the real terror that Adam's sin unleashed," visitors will be warned.
A display showing ancient Babylon will deal with the Tower of Babel and "unravel the origin of so-called races'', while the final section will show the life of Christ, as an animated angel proclaims the coming of the Saviour and a 3D depiction of the crucifixion.
In keeping with modern museum trends, there will also be a cafe with a terrace to "breathe in the fresh air of God's creation'', and a shop "crammed'' with creationist souvenirs, including T-shirts and books such as A is for Adam and Dinky Dinosaur: Creation Days.
The museum's opening will reinforce the burgeoning creationist movement and evangelical Christianity in the US, which gained further strength with the re-election of President Bush in November.
Followers of creationism have been pushing for their theories to be reintegrated into American schoolroom teaching ever since the celebrated 1925 "Scopes Monkey Trial", when US courts upheld the right of a teacher to use textbooks that included evolutionary theory.
In 1987, the US Supreme Court reinforced that position by banning the teaching of creationism in public schools on the grounds of laws that separate state and Church.
Since then, however, many schools – particularly in America's religious Deep South – have got around the ban by teaching the theory of "intelligent design", which claims that evolutionary ideas alone still leave large gaps in understanding.
"Since President Bush's re-election we have been getting more membership applications than we can handle,'' said Mr Ham, who expects not just the devout, but also the curious, to flock through the turnstiles. "The evolutionary elite will be getting a wake-up call."
I have a great deal of knowledge in Hebrew. If you mean I have not practiced writing, I don't need to do that. The Bible is already written.
You know, you are coming very close to attacking the person instead of the argument. I don't remember what Hebrew scholarship you have shown, but if you would like to demonstrate some biology or biology in Hebrew that would be fine.
"If so, glad to see you're coming around ... ain't grace wonderful?"
I am simply trying to get you to talk about the subject of this thread-biology. The Bible does not speak to biology. That is the whole problem with creationism. They try to demonstrate some link from misinterpretation of the Bible to argue against science.
"I've got a friend who is a Born Again "
I had a friend that was a creationist, but the men in white coats swooped down and "raptured" him.
Pick your destination. According to Jesus' own mouth there is only one way to the being He calls Father. That is the God I choose to believe in. The consequence of my choice is that I will receive, at the end of my "mortal" life, only what He may have the power and authority to provide.
Other choices have other destinations.
I'm supposed to believe the rest of these good, holy men are going to burn in hell for all eternity?
I don't know about the "burning in hell for all eternity" part but, unless Jesus was a liar - they won't be in the presence of, and in eternal relationship with, the God that Jesus called Father. Jesus said the he is the only way to that particular destination.
Granted, this claim angers people. That's why it's referred to as the Scandal of the Particular
All absolutely factual.
But cross posting is frowned on and impolite. Not that I care too much, except it is a bit like some sort of perverted stalking.
It is also coming close to ad hominem, basically calling me a liar. I resent it and it gives little credibility to your asserting Christianity.
You and Dataman are starting to give me the creeps. I may have to put you on shun, too.
Ed, are you saying you are double minded?
You are Shubi. Is the Ark real or not, you can't have it both ways
What do you think the Ark was?
I was attacking the character of Ken Ham, not attacking your arguments by calling you a name or demeaning your character.
Since I have no evidence of any character in you, I can't comment.
I haven't called you a liar, yet.
You seem to be supporting calling me one.
I would suggest to you that I am not the subject of this debate. The subject is biology and the laughable claim that Adam ran with dinosaurs.
Do you have any evidence that Adam really existed and that he ran with dinosaurs. We know that dinos existed, since we found their fossils.
That would be a refreshing change
evo reindeer games. They've assigned shubi the task of getting the thread closed down or sent to the SBR
I told you what I think it is. You must tell me what you think it is, otherwise we can't continue.
I don't think you are correct. I think you hear the truth about science and misinterpretations of the Bible by creationists and confuse that with a personal attack.
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