This is an amusing tale of creationist hypocrisy. Ken Ham is complaining that one of his staff members was “ambushed”, because he wasn’t given a solo interview, but had to share the discussion with a critic (meanwhile, Ham has no compunction about “ambushing”, in the same sense, scientific discussions). What I found most interesting, though, were Ken Ham’s complaints about the BBC.
This past week, Dr. Jason Lisle–our astrophysicist*—was invited to be on a BBC radio program out of Southampton , England (where I spoke a couple of weeks ago). We were told that it was just going to be an “examination of creationism.” Well, we are somewhat leery when it comes to dealing with the British media–by far, British journalists and commentators (and particularly those from the BBC) are the most mocking about biblical Christianity of all the media we’ve worked with over the years. We have had probably 20 different countries send reporters to the Creation Museum since we opened 22 months ago, and most of them have been fair and balanced in their coverage–but not so with the typical British reporter.
Take a bow, any typical British reporters reading this. Could you please come over here and give lessons to typical American reporters?
*You have to giggle at the idea of an astrophysicist who claims that the universe is only 6000 years old.
Makes me feel proud to be British!
having the Creationist Museum exist makes me feel embaressed to be an American.
*Sings national anthem while standing to attention* (not a euphemism)
Headdesk.
All Americans in favor of kidnapping British journalists and impressing them into service here say aye.
Aye!
Hooray for Auntie Beeb!
They’re also the only ones who asked Geert Wilders some real questions – the Dutch media always handle him with velvet gloves.
‘fair and balanced’, i wonder if thats because the other reporters didnt have a clue about biology either.
i wonder if ham confuses realistic questions with mocking, eg ‘so wheres the evidence that kids played with dinosuars, coughh, hmm, ha, ha, HAHAHAHAHA, what a fucking insane imbecile, HAHAHAHAHA’
The Beeb is an example of what journalism can do when it doesn’t have to depend on adverts to pay the bills.
from hams article
‘Then again, for those people who don’t believe in God and there is no absolute authority, not telling the truth and deception would not be ethically wrong—as they have no basis for right and wrong! So , I guess we should say that this is just an example of BBC staff being consistent with what they believe!’
its suprising then that the BBC didnt just chop off hams head and posted its consumption on youtube instead of practicing some subtle deception.
silly old ham.
Would that be ‘GOD save the Queen’?
Let’s take a moment to crow over the success of our journalists and then get back to serious business of separating church and state!
Journalistic press gangs…? Brilliant!
Me too.
Remember, iago, that Mr. Ham was exported from the Commonwealth, being a former resident of XXXX, to the US because he wanted to make more money. Ken Ham knows he’s running a con.
Yeah, same here. :(
Ugh. Still with the “fair and balanced” sctick. Fair and balanced = create false dichotomy.
I’m so sick of this thought meme that any time there is a disagreement both sides are valid. Some things are just freaking WRONG!
What’s funny though is I’ve been avoiding US news for so long I was hoping they might have gotten over it by now.
In other words, British journalists tend to be more objective when dealing with creationists. I get it now!
Although I must add the caveat that British editorial boards impress me somewhat less. Remember that New Scientist ran that “Darwin Was Wrong!” cover. And it was the British station (Channel 4, I believe) that decided to name Dawkins’ mini-series “The Root Of All Evil” over Dawkins’ loud protestations (the final comprimise was to add a question mark to the end of the title–still wrong IMO).
For verily doth speake ye prophete Moroniah, “Thou shalt not giveth the view of thy inter to ye tribe of Be’eb, for their harsh questionynge of the LORD’s truth doth be an abomination unto the LORD.” And ye menfolk riding ye dinosaures grunted in agreemente.
How anyone in their right mind can, in this day and age, think the world is 6 000 years old is beyond me.
Hey, PZ, I think instead of astrophysicist they meant “ass who failed physics”. Just a minor typo on their part really.
He’s so eager to throw that ‘ist’ on the end of evolution that he does it where it doesn’t even make sense.
I feel that Jason Lisle should have the title “Astrophysician”. It combines the folksy woo of “astrology” with the generalised, medieval, doctorish “physician”. It could be a modern term for someone who looks into the stars, notes that they are still there, then advises you to wrap up warm and read the bible – possibly with a little general talk about cutting down on sin, particularly those of thought and flesh – hence the medical connotations.
Who could possibly object to that?
@ Morsky
They live only in the now. No past or future. And they’re trying to drag us into their world view.
Brian @11:
Perhaps they could cruise the pubs at late hours and gather up the ink stained wretches while they are not able to put up a fight. Next morning…they find themselves shackled to desks at major media sources. Love the idea.
Hihi Science Pundit
Channel 4 is a commercial TV station, they have adverts and so on unlike the BBC so that was likely a draw viewers in to make more money from the ads decision
New Scientist, meh, I stopped buying that 3 years ago, I’d read it religiously since school (early 90s) but it’s not the same magazine it was then. This isn’t the first time they’ve misleadingly proclaimed someone wrong on the cover either, they did it with Einstein while I was still buying it… but yes, again a commercial operation ~shrug~
You have to remember the BBC is funded by the TV license so doesn’t need to worry about commercial interests at all, this gives them much more freedom (although not as much as I’d like, poor Greg Dyke -.-)
Excellent to see some balance for a change and that (one of the few times) someone doesn’t ignore the elephant in the room.
Ok dude, but then what’s your excuse?
“Take a bow, any typical British reporters reading this.”
Sadly, typical British reporters do not have the slightest clue about science and wins like this are usually anomalies. There are many more sickening examples of loathsome British science ‘journalism’ than there are shining.
Incidentally, for those of you who can get it, Andrew Marr’ss 3xI hour (!) BBC series “Darwin’s Dangerous Idea” was fantastic viewing, despite his frequent use of the term “Darwinist”. The episode on eugenics and the final solution was particularly brilliant – pointing out, inter alia, that the Nazis thought they had destroyed Darwin’s idea that the human race was just one species.
He also says, rather movingly I thought, that 150 years later we finally realise the importance of hotspots of evolutionary diversity, and specifically coral reefs; and the first person ever to conduct a scientific study of coral reefs was, of course, Charles Darwin.
@20: I could. Astrophysician, heal thyself. :-P
@22: I think they do have a concept of past and future, only it goes something like this.
God makes world in 7 days -> God makes USA, world’s #1 nation ever -> Rapture
It’s a stunted, crabbed and petty view of the world. That’s why it’s so sickening to hear the religious prate on about science destroying the enchantment and majesty of the world and eliminating the higher power. What they want is not an inscrutable absolute being but a magical buddy who’ll help them win the lottery or find a parking spot, comfort them when in times of need, hate all the people they hate and help little Jimbo’s team win the game – an earthbound, picayune deity concerned with the comparably insignificant.
British journalists may be a bit less afraid of challenging religious claims than those of some other nationalities, but they have plenty of other forms of shiteness. I know of nowhere else with such a preponderance of credulous, PR-led “Pill for this/ Gene for that/ Equation for the other” stories passing for science coverage.
“Then again, for those people who don’t believe in God and there is no absolute authority, not telling the truth and deception would not be ethically wrong—as they have no basis for right and wrong!”
” — Ken Ham.
Ken Ham should be SO VERY HAPPY that he is SO WRONG, because I feel a strong urge to hit him over the head with an antique Ming dynasty vase for saying such utterly stupid things, but I fully realize that that would be a highly unethical and immoral thing for me to do, so I won’t do it.
What IS it with people who, EVERY time they open their mouth, put their foot in it?
How can a moron gain a Ph.D in astrophysics…
Easy he lied in his exams!…How very Christian!
I like this one from Hambone…
I suppose he be a looking for de bones of that Adam…easily recognized…tas got a rib missing!
“You have to remember the BBC is funded by the TV license so doesn’t need to worry about commercial interests at all, this gives them much more freedom”
That’s not quite true. The BBC has to turn a profit, but is limited in what it can charge for the license, yet has restrictions that no other UK TV company has and can’t advertise (at least, not in the UK).
This is an insane situation. The BBC is fundamentally selling the same kind of product as its competitors, but is at the same time in a completely different business.
I’m not sure this gives them any more ‘freedom’ than any other company. They do produce some superb shows, though. Their flagship nature shows are head and shoulders above the competition. Perhaps this is made possible only by the anachronistic license fee and the unlevel playing field, but I doubt it.
I don’t think we brits have better journalists or a more rational population particularly!
But some of our more aged journalistic institutions are maintaining standards.
Maybe there’s just more of a liberal-intellectual tradition that runs through the BBC.
Much as I’m aware New Scientist isn’t flavour of the month right now, it’s at least nice to have a mainstream magazine with a large circulation that puts science on the front cover.
You have to giggle at the idea of an astrophysicist who claims that the universe is only 6000 years old.
No. You really don’t. Tears would be more appropriate
Examining his output from the NASA ADS system I see that he did a PhD thesis on solar granulation and since then has published only a pedagogical article on understanding black holes. Still, it’s more sad than funny.
“most of them have been fair and balanced in their coverage” — Ken Ham
1. How can you be fair and balanced about something that’s neither?
2. The LAST thing a creationist wants, is to see his world view being ‘balanced’ by a different view. There is nothing to be balanced: it’s his way or the highway.
So I guess the creationist expression ‘fair and balanced’ actually means ‘polite and uncritical’.
As far as KH’s “they have no basis for right and wrong!” thing goes, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone simply point out in response that morality is the basis of society. Humans benefit greatly from living in large, cooperative groups (societies). In order for this to be possible, they must respect certain rules such as not killing or stealing. If we didn’t do this, society would break down and we’d be worse off, so the basis of morality is membership of society – no god required.
I keep thinking the stupidity will end a week from now or a month from now. It is eternal.
American “journalism” has to balance their stories with the views of their advertisers, or risk losing income. The BBC, being publicly funded, doesn’t have to worry about this.
RE: #13 , Oh i know Ken was exported from the Commonwealth, I just wish he hadn’t come here. His level of wackaloonery is not something the world needs.
Although I must admit ancient chariots drawn by velociraptors would be pretty kick ass.
Personally I’m regularly pissed off by the BBC by the way it panders to religious types: “Thought for the day” and various presenters using their time to hijack the airwaves by having some pious arse talk about how the world is going to the dogs without Jeebus.
However, that isn’t journalism. So yay for the hacks who see the cracks.
The BBC have made a few high-profile mistakes, so it’s nice to see them getting something right for once. (Disclaimer: I have a bit of a pro-BBC bias, coming from a family with connections to the world’s greatest broadcasting organisation.)
Almost nobody in this country believes that the universe is only 5770 years old, and “religious fundamentalist nutjob” means anybody who goes to Church both at Christmas and Easter.
Recently I caught a programme on the Beeb called “History of religion”, I think, but it turned out to be fronted by a scientist and from that perspective. Can’t remember his name. He went to Ken ham place and interviewed this “Astroboy” who was made to look extremely stupid. Catch it if you can.
I’ve always been very impressed with British journalism, aside from the very pervasive right-wing tabloid media. I remember a few years ago watching a Gordon Brown interview and I honestly couldn’t identify the political opinion of the interviewer. There were no party talking points in his questions, but there was real criticism that demanded tough answers from Mr. Brown … but again, it wasn’t particularly partisan, and it wasn’t done in a “Some people are saying” way either. Very different from the softball and bitter partisanship on this side of the pond.
To be honest, the Beeb’s science reporting is usually pretty poor, and the website’s reporting is almost as bad as the Mail’s.
Don’t fool yourself:
http://www.badscience.net/2009/03/venal-misleading-pathetic-dangerous-stupid-and-now-busted/
The BBC does do wonderful things though. Thought for the day, songs of praise, the proms…
Off topic, but it does involve the BBC News.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7959155.stm
It’s good for a laugh ;)
I would suppose that this is due to a difference of the people. Surely the media in different countries are different due to what the people want: if people want nonsense, like in the U.S., the people will get it. That goes for 95% of the world as well.
Southampton – the City of my birth!
Of course when your school was founded 450 years ago, Medieval walls still exist around the old town, the name is derived from Anglo Saxon roots (1200 years ago), and Roman remains have been found (from 1700 years ago), then ascribing the age of the universe to a mere 6,000 years seems irrational.
Even more so when you can go to local museums and see fossilised mammoth teeth and wood dug out when dredging the estuary. Let alone the depth/height of the nearby chalk downs which filter the City’s drinking water (very hard water, tough on kettles and boilers and creationist timelines).
From a link about the creationist take on carbon dating in Ken Ham’s article:
So this must be what their astrophysicist, Dr. Jason Lisle, believes:
The moon as an independent light source! Dr. Lisle probably also believes that the stars are really as small as they look and are much closer to us than those evil atheist astronomers would like us to think.
(alan @42)
That must have been difficult.
Songs of Praise:
“I Love Trash” by Oscar the Grouch
“I Wish I Was an Oscar Meyer Wiener”
“Gimme Noise” by the Replacements
“I Wanna Be Me” by Iggy and the Stooges
“My Sharona” eeww OK I’m quitting this line of thought.
Tbh, aside from their clear stances on things like creationism the British media is certainly not all that grat when it comes to science. Just look at their coverage- or should I say creation- of the MMR autism scare in the UK. That was not restricted to the tabloids, although they shoulder the bulk of the blame for carrying it on for so long.
Someone linked Ben Goldacre above. The day British science reporting is even vaguely decent he’s out of a job. He’s thriving, so that’s clearly not the case!
for those americans who are upset about the creation museum- we have one too (all though not quite the same scale). there is a review here:
http://the-red-ferret.blogspot.com/2008/08/portsmouth-creationism.html
interestingly recursive- it started with a comment here!
http://naturenet.net/blogs/index.php/2009/03/08/inside_the_uk_s_creationist_museum_part_1
this is better- a review of the place itself
The Ass-troll-physician is in trouble with the whole sun stood still bit as well as the moon as a light source. Since the bible refers to the sun rising and setting, then it follows that Copernicus, Kepler and the rest have it bass-ackwards. Can’t change what the bible says, so we’ve got it all fucking wrong.
As for the Brit press – I cannot imagine any American media even having the stones to challenge any of the Creationist bilge.
Trouble being that balance between truth and lies simply isn’t the least bit fair.
Ham doesn’t know how to use words together properly, though that’s not the least of his failings.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
Nor, for that matter, the greatest.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
Ya Seriously, I mean our media is looking up to a comedian for lessons. Anyone see a problem with this? I am so glad the BBC is on PBS btw, it’s the only TV source that I get my news from.
Strangebrew @31
You missed the second speaker, the Reverend Tony Breedon.
Otherwise known as
Sirius KnottSerious Nut, an irregular troll on this site.As a fan of Ken Ham, I expect him to show up on this thread any time soon to lambast PZ for his lack of respect.
Let’s not get too happy about British journalism. The British media is as guilty of pandering to populism and churning out PR-generated hype as any other country’s.
The treatment received by this creationist fool was due to a general British godlessness and cynicism, and a readiness to laugh at idiots (anyone in the UK sick of seeing a certain recently-deceased reality TV “star” will know what I mean).
When Tony Blair’s spin doctor, Alastair Campbell, declared “We don’t do God”, he was speaking for more than just our discredited ex-PM’s cabinet.
It’s hardly worth the bother. Most of the time the British meejah are hopeless at tackling falsehoods rather than promoting them (as you might recall from Ben Goldacre, if not from direct experience of them yourself). It’s just this one very narrow issue where the prevailing behaviour differs a little (perhaps the local boy effect of Darwin and Attenborough etc hasn’t quite worn off yet, despite American uncultural indoctrination of the world).
Fair brings a tear to me eye, so it does. Gawd bless Aunty Beeb :-)
Interesting background on Dr. Jason Lisle.
http://www.csharp.com/lisle.html
Apparently while at Colorado he reviewed papers and didn’t take exception to timescales in the millions of years. Of course, his claim was he was keeping his real theories under wraps while at university.
Poor Dr. Lisle – it’s just terrible how the mainstream science community strikes so much fear into the thousands of oppressed creationist scientists that they don’t feel they can even present their well-supported theories. Maybe we should have an amnesty day so they can all come out of hiding and be counted.
“Dr.” Lisle has clearly sold out. He is SOOOO much more famous, SOOO much better paid, SOOOO much more important in his role as the only creationist astrophysicist than he would be giving daily tours at the Tuscon planetarium. He’s sold his integrity for that little bit of fame.
corpus.callosum @ #10
Yeah, we don’t really focus on the lyrics. It’s a meaningless thing, like “Ob-la dee, ob-la da”
Or “Give peace a chance”
I’m trying to get it changed to “We are the champions”. We love our irony, don’t we?
OT but it has a Brit connection and creationists like Ham and other believers are sure to tout this as proof god hates evolutionary biologists and the devil’s hand is at work.
Son of Sylvia Plath Commits Suicide
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/24/books/24plath.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
Nicholas Hughes, the son of Sylvia Plath and the British Poet Laureate Ted Hughes, killed himself at his home in Alaska, nearly a half-century after his mother and stepmother took their own lives.
Mr. Hughes, 47, was an evolutionary biologist who studied stream fish and spent much of his time trekking across Alaska on field studies.
Journalists typically haven’t been well thought of over here:
“One cannot hope to bribe or twist
Thank God! the British journalist
But seeing what the man will do
Unbribed, there’s no occasion to”
It fair boggles the mind to wonder what the American sort are like….
This assholephysicist now probably thinks the stars are pinpricks in the firmament enabling the light of Heaven to shine through.
If the BBC are so blimmin’ secular, how come they never get a humanist to speak on Thought for the Day?
The BBC is fundamentally selling the same kind of product as its competitors – latsot
No, it’s not. Commercial TV companies are (primarily, in many cases only) selling advertising space. The programmes they show are ways to attract viewers, and hence make their product saleable.
Bzzzzztttt! (That’s my projection warning going off.)
James McGrath reports that Ham once did to him the same thing that Ham is complaining about now. I liked what McGrath reported to be Ham’s excuse: “…since the debate was to further God’s wishes, a minor deception of this sort was acceptable.” LOL!
#5:
Oh, please don’t kidnap and enslave the entire staff of the Daily Mail and Daily Express, Br’er Fox!
DiscoveredJoys at #48 wrote:
“Of course when your school was founded 450 years ago, Medieval walls still exist around the old town, the name is derived from Anglo Saxon roots (1200 years ago), and Roman remains have been found (from 1700 years ago), then ascribing the age of the universe to a mere 6,000 years seems irrational.”
Don’t make excuses for them. I am from Oklahoma. I can not go South of where I live without passing through a Precambrian mountain range and over the Marathon outcropping. When they bury my relatives the kids sift through the red dirt looking for 11,000 year old Clovis points and bison fossils.
The Boy Scouts and the 4-H clubs enter fossil finds in State Fair projects that would make Europeans weep. My mother has bookends of mammoth and mastodon teeth and my neighbors line their flowerbeds with giant ammonites.
This summer we will travel a little North to escape the heat in a gypsum cave and look at how a few years have obscured our scratched initials (encouraged)on selenite crystal deposits and see for ourselves, by shining a light through them and calculating in our heads, the 200 million years they have been growing.
I used trilobites for skipping stones here, 500 miles from the sea.
In every creek bed and on every eroded hillside, my home is a geologic and evolutionary synopticon.
Yet I share my home with people who think Apatosaurus and Pentaceratops were eaten 5000 years ago by hungry Native American tribes.
Theirs is a willful ignorance it is unconscionable atrocious and nothing….absolutely nothing can excuse it.
It is simply wicked.
Just left this message at the “feedback” link of AiG.
Of course it will never see the light of day.
If you read the original article on Exploring Our Matrix — be sure to note Ham’s hypocrisy.
The part I found interesting:
Iago, I am not an USAian but a Cymro and I am ashamed that creation museums are anything but a historical curiosity anywhere on this planet in the 21st. Century.
@Knockgoats:
That’s what I meant by selling the same things but being in a different business. TV shows are coming out the end, but the BBC isn’t selling advertising.
We lived in the UK for 5 years in the 1990’s. I grew to love British journalism, both print and broadcast, for their ‘no-holds-barred’ approach to celebrities and politicians. While they have more than enough ignorant tabloid journalism, at the other extreme they have excellent, well-prepared political journalists who take great joy in eviscerating bloviating politicos at all levels, from the Prime Minister on down! I would have given much to see Jeremy Paxman deconstruct George Bush or Dick Cheney on-screen!
And so it was. It’s not our fault that creationism crumbles under the lightest examination, Hammy.
Is the who;e story made up ? I can’t find any reference on the massive BBC website ! Perhaps someone knows for sure?
They’re not. They’re just not sold on creationism (yet…). Unfortunately, David Attenborough gave up his position of power a long time ago (because, understandably, he wanted to have more fun for himself) but his influence hasn’t entirely gone.
The BBC’s Director General is a religious nutter (of the RC flavour) who made some evil promises to his fellow religious nutters. So there’ll be unmerited deference and air-time for religion for some time to come.
Steve Taylor, it appears it was for BBC local radio in Southampton rather than BBC national radio as one of Ham’s porkers was appearing/appeared in Southampton.
i SO want to smoke a fatty of primo shit and go to the creationist museum…
don’t you people dare get it bulldozed for a carwash till i’ve had a gander and giggle.
I’ve been trying to find the programme (I assume it is BBC Radio Solent), but the rest of the programming is such vapid drivel that listening to it is quite painful.
Re: #48
The mention of chalk got me thinking. Young Earthers insist that all geologic deposition formations, such as chalk, were laid down during the Flood. Given that the chalk deposits come from marine organisms, has anyone done the calculations to determine the density of said organisms that would be required to lay down the British Isle chalk deposits in less than a year? I could only find hints of it on talk.origins.
Thanks.
Don’t be too up on our journalists PZ, the fact that the Beeb will bend over backwards to introduce ‘balance’ is not unreservedly wonderful. For eg you have medical doctors and professors having to justify the best science to woo mongers galore. Then there is the New Scientist being craven and not standing behind Amanda Gefter’s piece on how to tell a creationist piece of ‘science’ from the real thing.
Strange. Given Auntie Beeb’s fondness for telepathic parrots, quackery and threeheaded frogs, I’m honestly surprised that they don’t get along swimmingly with the Pigletfucker.
Ken Ham is right. The British pres and particularly the BBC is unable to present an unbiased discussion on anything involving creationism without resorting to mockery.They are a public service broadcaster and as such have a responsibility to be fair to all points of view. Remember, this is the broadcaster that refused to carry an appeal for the people of Gaza who had been repeatedly bombed and attacked by Israel. Their argument, they had to remain neutral. But when it comes to the evolution/creation debate they take sides.
No mater what evolutionists say, they follow a theory as to how things came into existence without divine intervention. Creationism is the theory that says everything came into existence through the actions of Divinity.
We share the same evidences, but approach them from a differing perspective. Maybe we are both wrong, and that we are the result of intervention by little green men from outer space.
Oh, and could someone please tell me when evolution started, with the big bang or later. Because lately I have been told by evolutionists that the big bang has nothing to do with evolution. Contrary to what I have been told repeatedly down the years.
Make your minds up guys! But when our theory fails the litmus test of reality, then we have to make it up as we go along.
@PeteHodge
By whom? Possibly because when debating with creationists and other believers that start with evolution the discussion often veers off as the believers run away from evolution when people like me who are aware of and have the evidence and examples at their fingertips win the discussion. So the ‘what does your god do?’ question then goes further and further back in time with the believers harried all the way by scientists who know their stuff. The believers, their backs to the wall then retreat behind the ‘Big Bang’ and locate their god there away from where science can confidently stride. I have been part of many such discussions.
For the record then, the Big Bang is only relevant to evolution in the trivial sense that if there were no stars with planets there would have been no earth for live to get started on (again not part of evolution) and then begin to vary and diverge under selection.
no, it’s ok, really. it’s a fake, you can see it right here…. ;-)
anyway, good job British reporters for at least not supporting creationism. still, i can’t say that i like the Beeb all that much (even though BBC world still kicks CNN’s ass); I’m biased though, cuz they bought my favorite travel-guide company and are in the process of ruining it. there was even a wee bit scandal on that travel-guide forum because of censorship of posters’ comments…
PeteHodge: learn what the word “theory” means in science. until then, your post is so much hot air. your precious creationism isn’t a theory, it’s not even a hypothesis.
dude, most likely everything you “have been told repeatedly down the years” is either bullshit, severely mangled, or bounced off your lack of comprehension. evolution started with the appearance of life on earth. however, creobots think that all science is “evolutionism”, and since science in general concerns itself with everything from the big bang on, you guys think that’s when evolution started
also: star evolution != evolution. learn to distinguish names for things from the things themselves
#85 Scott
Darwin himself addresses the issue of sedimentation rates and erosion rates in chapter IX in The Origin Of Species.
He admitted that accurate figures were difficult to come by but reported that some observers estimated that sediment was deposited by the Mississippi at a rate of 600 feet per hundred thousand years. He also calculated that if chalk cliffs were denuded at the rate of one inch per century then the denudation of the Weald (near his home in Downe) would have taken around 300 million years – probably longer. Although this was only a rough estimate it gave him time enough for evolution to work.
#73 Prometheus
Absolutely right. I was merely explaining the obvious age of the place where I was born.
I now live in a village in the East Midlands only a couple of miles from the quarry where the first (identified) Precambrian fossil was found. There’s a cast of it in the nearby Leicester museum. It is not unusual around here to turn up Devil’s Toenails in the garden too.
Damn evolution, everywhere you go you keep tripping over it. Creationists must walk around with their eyes shut.
Oh.
Ginger Yellow: yup, the BBC can be crappy in its science reporting, majoring on science as it applies to humans or climate and little else. Its broadcast science on TV (step forward Horizon) makes me want to poke my eyeballs out with lobster forks.
Honourable mention to Richard Black the BBC website’s environment correspondent. An excellent reporter.
@10: Rule Britannia!, surely ;-)
(Probably not the official anthem, but one that would make more sense in the context? But even Rule Britannia! nods it’s head to religion, too.)
In defense of the poor Dr., astrophysics is probably the easiest subject to get away with creationism. After all, there’s no fossilized big bang in some museum, and the addition of inflation/dark matter/dark energy haven’t made the standard model that much more intuitive.
This sort of thing makes me feel alot more comforted. Outside their small sphere of True-Believers, YECs and ID proponents really have no traction with the overwhelming majority of sensible folk. When they cry “foul” it’s usually on their own blogs or to their Mammies.
Man, I had no idea that Genie Scott was such a threat in a “Oh NO! It’s Genie Scott! RUN FOR YOUR CREATIONIST LIVES!” kinda way. She seems like such a nice, polite lady…
I’m going to defend the science on the Beeb- remember it has to be accessible for those who know little about the subject. It’s like saying ‘OK PZ- last year’s syllabus- compress it into 30 seconds for people who don’t know the subject’. The other option is not to put science on the news.
This is the organisation that puts on programmes about sub-atomic physics, Fermats Theorum, and String Theory, as well as David Attenborough basically say ‘Evolution- WOW’. I wonder if the pro-evolution stance of the BBC would play well in the States?
And yes, the tabloid press is all Right Wing (because of the owners, and laxer rules), but it was the BBC that broke the ‘Dodgy Dossier’- ended up spanked for it, despite now being proven right.
That Palin interview- “Which magazines do you read” is ambush journalism according to the Right (hello MR Ham). How long would she have lased against Paxman, Snow, or Dimbleby. I once listened to Eddie Mair let a American woman moaning about abortion or evolution or something. He let her say everything she wanted, yet his questions while respectful, held up a big neon sign that said “WINGNUT”.
Radio Four. That bastion of the Middle Class Opinion formers broadcast this
http://lasthussar.wordpress.com/2009/03/10/an-angry-man-in-corduroy-says-it-best/
at 6:30pm on a Friday, in its prime Comedy slot. That’s a quarter of the programme on ONE RANT.
~PeterHodge
!!!
I guess you don’t know how American ultra-religio nutjobs feel about the fairness doctrine (which isn’t even “being fair to” or “giving equal time to” both sides, it’s merely presenting both sides).
How about Land of Hope and Glory or Jerusalem?
Of course Ken Ham complained. Eugenie Scott has bitch slapped Lisle before on CNN. And the hamster posted the transcript (with obligatory creationist footnotes) on this website.
http://answersingenesis.org/docs2004/1201debate.asp
Further down the page, Ham is crowing about how popular that clip of Shermer interviewing Purdom has been. Doesn’t seem to realise that it’s only popular like a train-wreck.
corpus.callosum@#10, the British institutionalized religion is a great thing. It’s a religion so milquetoasty that the vast majority of its adherents drift into agnositicism or outright atheism: a religion so all-inclusive that agnostics are accepted as priests. Thanks to the Anglican Church, religion is moribund in the UK. Long may it remain so.
British media can swing wildly from being outstandingly good to horribly crap, but I think overall the BBC does a good job, and the country is richer for it. Because of its funding structure, it produces some programs that no one else in the world can (whilst, of course, also producing piles of poo), and on the whole manages to stay politically neutral.
Stephen Fry gave a good overview of it on one of his itunes podcasts – episode 4, series 1. sorry I don’t know if you can link to itunes.
Creationism failed the litmus test of reality centuries ago.
Since then, creationists, including Ken Ham, have demonstrated that they are wholly uninterested in either attempting to investigating reality, or even attempting to demonstrate HOW to investigate reality with a literal interpretation of the King James’ translation of the Bible. Furthermore, creationists have demonstrated that the only things they are interested in are using their faith in Jesus Christ to secure monetary and political profit, as well as turning their fellow human beings into unthinking followers.
We should not be cheering this. They ambushed the guy. That should be unacceptable regardless of which side you are on or which side did it first. Gleefully encouraging this behavior when your side scores a point leads to the same kind of unproductive, tit for tat mentality we see in the Middle East (lesser scale, obviously).
GG,
Your concern is noted.
As James McGarth says:
If Ham is willing to spring surprises and use “deception,” he should not whine when it’s done to him.
Far from an ambush, the BBC’s chosen format with a representative of “both sides” of a controversial issue is required by both its own Broadcasting Standards and by those of OFCOM, the public regulator.
Had the BBC engaged in “an investigation of creationism” where someone wasn’t present to give the scientific point of view, there would have been very loud and very justifiable complaints.
Ham is just being a silly sausage as usual.
That Marcus Brigstocke rant is superb.
http://lasthussar.wordpress.com/2009/03/10/an-angry-man-in-corduroy-says-it-best/
From its content it must have been broadcast in mid-July, 2007 when the Court of Justice threw out the case of Lydia Playfoot who tried to get a ruling on the right to wear a chastity ring in school. This is just one of a number of cases in which the religious right has striven impotently to knock a hole in our secular culture. Others are the case of Lilian Ladele, a registrar whose attempt to get the right not to marry gay people was tossed out on appeal, and Nadia Eweida, who unsuccessfully sued British Airways for religious discrimination because they did not permit her to wear religious jewellery. They make a bit of a noise,but they always seem to fail. Good.
Because they’re Protestant you see, they can wear a little rubber sleeve on their John Thomases and have all the sex they want!
you do realize that creationists are predominantly protestant, right…?
What about the Guardian? I guess Ken Ham doesn’t know about the Guardian.
Yup, British journos, gotta love them. They’re not afraid to call a spade a garden digging implement, and they’ll even call an IDiot an idiot.
So, it appears they do have some uses. :)
Over here the BBC is regarded as being heavily pro-religion, their usual idea of a balanced discussion on a religious subject is to invite to the studio representatives of the major religions but no atheist. Science/religion discussions usually result in a scientist who is a Christian (no I don’t understand that one either) being invited. Ham must seriously have upset somebody!
“This is the organisation that puts on programmes about sub-atomic physics, Fermats Theorum, and String Theory, as well as David Attenborough basically say ‘Evolution- WOW’. I wonder if the pro-evolution stance of the BBC would play well in the States?”
True, but Attenborough aside (and that is a big aside), all the good Beeb output occurs when it allows scientists to talk about their field of expertise, which is all too rare and often on BBC 4 or at best BBC 2. Most of the time Horizon is sensationalist/human interest/consumer advice nonsense dressed up as science, while the science news reporting is horrendous. I’m sure it’s on balance better than your typical US network, but you have to admit that’s a pretty low bar. If it weren’t for Attenborough, it would be pretty hard to argue that the Beeb’s overall output was a net positive for the public understanding of science.
Fair and balanced? Sometimes, one of the sides is just wrong. Let’s not pretend otherwise.
Also, whenever I read something about religious beliefs and Biblical creationism, I’m reminded by Monty Python and the Holy Grail…
King Arthur: This new learning amazes me, Sir Bedevere. Please tell me again how sheep’s bladder may be employed to prevent earthquakes.
From Ham-strung’s blog post on the subject…
1. The “organisation” (presumably a reference to the NCSE) does NOT have as its sole purpose to oppose creationism. Rather, the NCSE exists to ensure that sound science subjects are the only ones taught in science classrooms, and that the teaching of science is free of interference from dogmas of ANY sort – religious or otherwise.
2. Evolution is quite capable of “upholding” itself without the need for intervention by Ms Scott, the NCSE, or any atheist on the planet. It has successfully done so for at least 3.2 Billion years, and whether they like it or not, even the mighty fundamentalist Christian right will be totally unable to stop it.
3. Please, please, please America, we Aussies don’t want old Hammy back. Sorry that you have to put up with his nonsense ramblings and silly creation museum, but lets face it, one or more of you obviously agreed to let him in. If he gets too much out of hand, arrange a nice cosy padded cell for him, but whatever you do, don’t let him abuse your children with his crazy ideas.
@PeteHodge #88
Here is a good page to start dispelling some of your ignorance: The Evolution Fact FAQ
On the other hand, I’m so glad you, an obvious creationist, were bold enough to make this admission…
Thanks for the chuckle!
I agree that the Beeb can do good science. Last night it was Darwin’s Dangerous Idea (not Dennett’s book) an account of the moral, family and professional travails that beset Darwin in trying to get his theory published in an environment and form where it might see some acceptance. It was well done.
Creation Museum. John Boehner.
Two infamous Cincinnati-based abominations.
From the trenches here in Jesusland…
My apologies to America !
*hangs head, muttering*
Hey, don’t beat yourselves up too badly, yanks.
I live in Southampton, and 20 minutes down the coast is the town of Portsmouth.
Home of – wait for it, wait for it – a creationist museum!!
Ta-daaah!
That’s right, the US is not alone.
I promise I’ll go and have a look at it and report back. It’s not to US standards, I can tell you that – very much smaller, no animatronics and probably only a teeny tiny museum shop – but, you know, anything you guys can do, we can do smaller. (Aircraft carriers, basketball players, etc.)
@ Peter Ashby #121:
That’s not really science though. That’s history / drama / biography etc. Your hint should have been when you typed “an account of the moral, family and professional travails”. That’s how the BBC have ruined Horizon – by making it all into a formulaic, people-focused drama.
Makes me proud to pay my licence fee.
Why’s everybody so down on the Creation Museum? It is an astounding, mind-boggling, jaw-dropping experience — for young and old! faux mulder’s got exactly the right attitude about it — it is best experienced stoned — but even straight it is a wonder to behold. I tried taking some notes on those particular exhibits and ideas that were without any foundation in reason and rationality, and I had to give up. Everywhere I turned, each new exhibit, around every corner, more and more and more of it. Really, if you enjoyed the fantasy worlds of Lord of the Rings, or Harry Potter, or Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, this will top them all, because they BELIEVE IT’S TRUE! They do!
Nope. Creationists – every single one of them – simply don’t know that the majority of the evidence even exists.
BTW, only Christian apologists ever use the word “evidences”. All others treat it as a mass noun, like “sand”, “water”, or “information”…
If you can answer the question “if I were wrong, how would I know?”, you’re doing science.
If you were wrong, how would you know?
The definition of evolution is “descent with heritable modification”. So, what can evolve?
What you’ve been told all those years you’ve been told by creationists who didn’t understand what they were talking about (but I repeat myself).
As an Irishman, I never give praise to the Brits if I can avoid it… (:P) But I gotta say, the BBC fucking rocks. Seriously.