Shurn the Awesomer
The Origins Debate

The Origins Debate

Written on Wed, 17 August 2016


The debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham is arguably the most well-known debate on Creationistic and Naturalistic origins. Held at Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky, the 2 gentlemen debates on the question, "Is Creation A Viable Model of Origins in today's modern scientific era?" live on the internet.

I'm going to look into detail of their debate with a critical eye, while being as unbiased as I can while looking at evidence. I'm a creationist and an atheist-turn-christian. A transcript of their debate can be found here at youngearth.org. I have no affiliation with Answers In Genesis. My opinions are solely mine.

The Opening Statement



As Ken Ham starts first, he asserts that science is grossly misrepresented, that scientist cannot be a creationist. Then he goes on to highlight 2 other creationist who have contributed greatly to science, Stuart Burgess and Dr. Raymond Damadian.

He highlights next that many schools in the USA teaches naturalism in science textbooks. And that because it doesn't differentiate observational science and historical science, all information are presented as facts when historical science is man's idea about the past.

So far, so good. I can relate much of what has been mentioned by Ken Ham. Growing up in Singapore, I was, at one time, forced by my own conviction to never follow fairy tales. Thus all of creation stories were, to me, a fairy tale. I delved deep into science, from books on dinosaurs to astronomy. I was very fascinated by these stories. I thought our origins were well-explained and I could take proud that I have such knowledge. It's only when I'm much older did I realise that these man-made stories were "man-made". They hold no more credibility than the stories of the bible.

Next up was Bill Nye's opening statement. Interestingly, he highlighted a TV show and made relevance to the rest of his view. He asserts that science does not differentiate between observation and historical science, as what Ken Ham mentioned about textbooks in schools. And that CSI drama series, and real world crime scene investigation, also does not make such distinct difference. So I decided to do up a little digging.

I looked up the internet and found this webpage that simplifies the details of how crime investigation is conduct and by who. Based on what I quote from the page, here's what I understood:

  • (Observational Science) physical evidence can be collected at a scene
  • (Observational Science) The investigator must be a "Certified Crime Scene Analyst"
  • (Historical Science) The investigator must be a "Certified Crime Scene Reconstructionist"
  • (Observational Science) Record and preserve evidence
  • (Historical Science) clues to indicate how the crime occurred

Nope, I don't see Bill's point. Real world CSI clearly identifies that there is a phase where you collect present evidence and use it to reconstruct the past. The differentiation exists. As Ken Ham puts it, there is observational science and historical science.

Then Bill goes on speak on the Global Flood and Noah's Ark, asking us if it's reasonable to believe? But didn't elaborate on why it is or it is not. Perhaps time constraints. Granted.

Bill also mentions about the grand canyon and relating it to the global flood. He posed a question for the audience, why didn't the animals swim up? So I decided to look around the internet again and let science answer it. The grand canyon was formed rapidly, that's why the animals didn't have the time to swim up.

So far, in my opinion, Bill's opening isn't much of a convincer. But he invites everyone to look at the evidence he will present. So alright, I'm going to sit up and listen.

The Presentation


Ken Ham proceeds to elaborate on his opening statement, highlighting these:

  • 4 other scientist who are also creationist and their achievements in their respective scientific fields.
  • Admittance that he cannot directly observe the creation of universe by God.
  • Textbooks do sometime differentiate between observational science and historical science.
  • The disagreements are in the interpretation of the past, and not the evidence itself.
  • Either God is the ultimate authority or man is the ultimate authority.
  • The lack of differentiation in observational science and historical science is causing kids to not think critically about origins.
  • The difference between the tree of life from molecules-to-man to creation tree of life.
  • The word "science" and "evolution" is hijacked by secularist to refer to both the observable and the unobservable.
  • Genesis in the bible is the foundation of christianity.


So far, I am able to relate most of it. While Ken presents much on the differences in worldviews and the unfair treatment of scientist who are creationist, Bill Nye proceeds to present some evidence that suggest an old Earth of millions of years.

Bill highlighted these:

  1. A limestone with a fossil he picked up on the side of the road (Really? Side of the road?) as evidence that limestone takes more than 4000 years to form.
  2. 680 000 layers of snow ice drilled in Antarctica, suggesting that 680 000 winter/summer cycles, thus 680 000 years have existed.
  3. Trees more than 6000 years old.
  4. Grand Canyon rock layers showing age, which is refuted by science.
  5. The order of fossils in the rock layers shows timeline.
  6. Kangeroos uniquely found in Australia shows that post-flood conditions would find fossils on the way to Australia.
  7. 16 million species on Earth today based on 7000 kinds on Noah's Ark would result in 11 new species found daily.
  8. If there is a global flood, heavy rocks wouldn't appear on land, but sink deep.
  9. 8 Unskilled person wouldn't be able to build the ark, if 14 skilled shipwrights are not able to build a wooden boat slightly smaller than the ark, the wyoming, and keep it properly maintained.
  10. Noah and his family is incapable of taking care of 14 000 animals.
  11. Scientist found Tiktaalik as predicted
  12. Asexual vs sexual proves evolution.
  13. Stars moving away suggest that stars were much closer in the past.
  14. Predictions realised because of the Big Bang Theory.
  15. Rubidium and strontium tells the age of the Earth.
  16. Rubidium not available as a form of heart treatment in Kentucky.

True to his word, Bill showed 11 evidence that claims old earth. 3 others were a challenge to Noah's credibility, and 1 was on Kentucky's governance, which either has no relations to the debate or he's trying to imply that Ken Ham has prevented an important form of heart treatment in the state. He also didn't address Ken's point and his defense on his opening statement, that there is no distinguishment observational science and historical science. In fact, most the evidences he points to, are present observations, then used to predict the past.

As curiousity get the better of me, I decided to look for some answers:

  1. Limestone doesn't need millions of years to form. As I learnt, you can form any form of sediments to rocks really fast, like cement which contains lime.
  2. World War 2 planes have been found deep in 260 feets of ice. If glacier ice takes so long to build up, the plane wouldn't be 260 feet below. Glacier snow ice doesn't take more than 1000 years for a few metres to build. If about 50 years is all it took to be 260 feet deep, it would mean that the lowest part of the ice core is less than 1000 years old. Taking compression into account, it will still be less than 6000 years old.
  3. Multiple tree rings can grow per year, therefore trees are not an accurate indicator of age.
  4. The grand canyon was formed rapidly. Need me say more?
  5. This is how a global catastrophic flood might look like, scene taken from Deep Impact:In the global flood, you would expect the first casualty would be shallow-water marine invertebrates, since the flood began in the ocean basins, thus forming in the strata layer. The sediments washed shoreward from the ocean basins would have progressively buried fish, then amphibians and reptiles living in lowland, swampy habitats, before eventually sweeping away the dinosaurs and burying them next, and finally at the highest elevations destroying and burying birds, mammals, and angiosperms. This is the order of burial, not the age of the earth. You never, ever find a higher animal mixed in with the lower one any where in the world. This is evidence of a global flood. Ken Ham proves his point here, that same evidence is interpreted with different lens.
  6. How is kangeroo found in such an isolated continent? When Krakatoa erupted in 1883, the island remained lifeless for years. But it was eventually populated by insects, earthworms, lizards, snakes, birds, and a few mammals. It's easy to imagine birds populating it, but land-dwelling creatures? It's possible for animals to migrate despite great obstacles. Fossilisation is a rare event, requiring sudden burials.
  7. No, 11 new species are not found daily. 10 000 new species of animals are found every year, that's ~27 new species every day.
  8. If you can find seabed on top of mount Everest, what's so surprising about big rocks on near sea-level land?
  9. How do you know Noah is unskilled? Just an important note, the Ark is not built to sail, it's built to float. Wyoming needed to sail.
  10. Most of the animals are young, thus they do not require much food. It's not difficult to stock up lots of food for the animals for 1 year, after I looked at the food storage chart.
  11. Does Bill Nye know that this supposed transitional species lost its transitional status in 2010? And Tiktaalik isn't lizard-like, but has fins that is entirely fish-like. This evidence is already refuted.
  12. How does his Sexual and Asexual reproduction example prove that species can transit from one type to another? We humans are still reproducing after our own kind, and so are the topminnows.
  13. Hubble did not noticed stars moving apart. He noticed distant galaxies moving apart instead. The stars in our Milky Way are orbiting around the center of the Milky Way, so half the stars are moving towards us and the other half are moving away from us. It's also important to note that Hubble observed redshift. The interpretation is that the universe is expanding. The first suggestion of Big Bang is by Lemaitre, not Sir Fred Hoyle , in 1927. Sir Fred Hoyle was a big critic of the Big Bang model, and a proponent of the steady state theory, till his death in 2001. Bill Nye briefly described trigonometric parallax as a method for measuring distance of stars. This method only works for the closest stars. Stars that are farther away are measured with other methods.
    • Despite my critique of Bill's erroneous statements, he did raise an important issue, the light travel problem. We must first realise that a light year is a measurement of distance, not time. It is our understanding of the duration it takes for light to travel in 1 year, that we infer the age of the star and the galaxies. From a creation standpoint, there is no natural explanation to a young earth theory. So far, there is only supernatural explanation attempts, such as local cosmic time and rapid accelerated events. After all, nothing during the creation week is natural. This problem is, by far, still a big stumbling block for most creationist. I'm willing to admit that this is faith.
    • It's worth noting that the light-travel problem isn't exclusive to Creationistic account. The bigbang theory also has its own light-travel problem, known as horizon problem. It states that light and heat wouldn't have enough time to spread to the different regions of the universe, yet the temperature throughout the universe is relatively similar. Various theories have been proposed, but none satisfactory.
  14. COBE stands for Cosmic Background Explorer, not Cosmic Observatory for Background Emissions. The Big Bang model did not predict the temperature of of the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation, it predicted the existence of the CMB. The COBE data showed a perfectly smooth CMB with regard to temperature. It wasn't until the application of a very sophisticated statistical analysis by George Smoot and his team that they were able to tweak out of the COBE data temperature fluctuations an order of magnitude lower.
  15. Rubidium half-life measurements has fluctuated since 1948 measurements by Haxel, Houtermans, and Kemmerich of 6.0 x 1010 till 2012 Measurements of 4.962 x 1010. Rubidium is not an accurate dating method to determine the age of the earth.
  16. No relations or relevance to the debate topic. This is not a political rally.

As we can tell, both of these speakers spoke with very different objective. Ken Ham, right from the start till thus far, has been speaking out on the differences in worldview. He consistently highlights that evidence is not a tell-all, but subject to interpretation based on worldviews. Thus in his presentation, doesn't elaborate much on evidence, but on interpretations. He also goes on the highlight the unfair biased treatment of creation scientist by the media.

Bill on the other hand, goes on the highlight a lot on evidence, which much has been refuted. His only credible evidence so far, is the light travel problem. On several occasions, he made several misstatements which is unexpected from the executive director of the Planetary Society, and "the Science Guy".

The Rebuttal


So here comes the rebuttal, which is a punching session of words. Let's take a look at some of the main points and how they rebutted each other. Note: This is not a transcript of their conversation, but a rephrase of their conversation for better context and readability.

  1. Ken: You cannot observe the age of the earth[past].
    • Bill: You are observing the past when light reaches your eyes.
    • My Comments: Both of the speakers are referring to different context. While Ken is referring to the difference between observational process of science and the historical interpretation of science, Bill mentions physics. Although both is correct by its own merits, Bill's rebuttal is out of point.
  2. Ken: Engineers in Australia, searching out about a coal mine, found woody material in the basalt layer. Potassium-argon dating method used on the rocks dated it 45 000 000 years old, while radiocarbon dating used on the wood dated it 45 000 years old. 45 000 year old wood in a 45 000 000 year old rock is a problem.
    • Bill: Maybe the rocks slid on top.
    • Ken: The wood was encased in the rocks.
    • My Comments: Ken's point is proven. The dating methods we have today are potentially flawed.
  3. Ken: Dr. Steve Austin sampled a rock from a lava dome which started to form after Mount Saint Helens erupted. The dating from the rock was 350 000 years old. when the minerals amphibole and pyroxene were seperated, potassium-argon dating on amphibole gave 900 000 years old and pyroxene gave 2 800 000 years old.
    • Ken: There are assumptions used regarding radioactive dating. Assumption 1: The amounts of the parent and daughter isotope at the beginning, when the rock formed. Assumption 2: That all daughter atoms measured today must have only been derived in situ as a result of radioactive decay of parent atoms. Assumption 3: the decay rates have remained a constant. There is no dating method that you can use that you can absolutely age date a rock.
    • Bill: Asteroids are dating very closely to each other, between 4 500 000 000 to 4 600 000 000 years old. Dating methods are reliable.
    • Ken: In 1942, some planes that landed on the ice field in Greenland were found under 250 feets of ice. Ice can build up catastrophically. Bill assumes one layer per year. It's like the dating methods, Bill is assuming things in regard to the past that are not necessarily true.
    • Bill: Accuses Ken of not addressing 680 000 years of snow ice layers, which requires winter/summer cycles.
    • My Comments: Ken elaborated more on the flawed dating methods we have today. Bill's argument that all the asteroids have similar dates when dating doesn't seem to address that dating methods are not reliable. After all, Dr. Steve Austin could sample 10 other rocks from the same place taken at the same time and he will also get very similar results compared to the first rock he took. Ken has already address that the snow ice layers, that snow ice can form rapidly. Bill's 680 000 layers of snow ice need to be recalculated.
  4. Ken: Christians believing in millions of years are still Christians because salvation is conditioned on faith in Christ, not on the age of the earth.
    • Bill: There are Christians who don't accept that the Earth could somehow be this extraordinarily young age. What is to become of them?
    • My Comments: As Ken mentioned, they still receive salvation.
  5. Ken: Hundreds of dating methods, and 90% of it contradicts billions of years. All dating methods are fallible.
    • My Comments: His point is proven, based on other arguments.
  6. Bill: The bible is translated over and over, in the span of 3 000 over years.
  7. Bill: Are fish sinners?
    • My Comments: Ken did not address this point. Perhaps this is due to it being unrelated to the debate topic? This is a theological question after all. When Adam and Eve sinned, all of creation fell. The law of not eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil is only applicable to man. Animals are not made in the image of God. They act out of instinct, not out of moral purpose or obligation.
  8. Bill: In astronomy, you are observing the past. Natural laws have not changed.
    • Ken: Natural laws hasn't changed. We have the laws of logic and the uniformity of nature and that only makes sense when [under] a biblical worldview, and that's why we can do experimental science, because we assume those laws are true, and they'll be true tomorrow.
    • Ken: You weren't there to observe tree rings or ice layers forming. You weren't there to observe how Kangeroos get to Australia.
    • Bill: 2nd accusation that Ken claims that natural laws have changed 4000 years ago.
    • My Comments: I hesitate to accuse him of not listening. Perhaps he miss out Ken's 2nd declaration that natural laws have not changed.
  9. Bill: All animals were vegetarians, yet lion's teeth are not set up for brocolli.
    • Ken: Most bears have teeth very much like a lion, or tiger, and yet most bears are primarily vegetarian. The panda's teeth should be a savage carnivore, but he eats mainly bamboo. The little fruit bat in Australia has really sharp teeth that looks like a savage little creature, yet it lives on fruits. Just because an animal has sharp teeth doesn't mean it's a meat eater, it just means it has sharp teeth.
    • My Comments: Ken's point is proven. If an animal has sharp teeth, it means it has sharp teeth.
  10. Bill: Using the bible as science textbook to be more respected than what is observed in nature is more troubling and unsettling point of view.
    • My Comments: No, the bible's primary purpose is concerning salvation, not a scientific literature. But it extends much into science as much as a science fiction novel concerning apples falling to the ground due to gravity.
  11. Bill: People are much more alike than they are different.
    • My Comments: So says the bible too. As mentioned by Ken during his presentation, Dr. Venter has already confirmed there is only 1 race.
  12. Bill: Ken Ham's view.
    • Ken: It's not just Ken Ham's view/model. It's many other PhD's scientist's.
    • My Comments: This just gets personal by Bill.
  13. Ken: Species and kinds are not the same term. Many dog breeds represent 1 kind, as an example.
    • My Comments: Bill did not answer this question directly. Perhaps he is answering by challenging back with the post-events of the flood, of how we have gotten the number of species we see today.
  14. Ken: Regard to the Missoula example, creationists do believe there has been post-flood catastrophism since Noah's flood.
    • My Comments: There has been major disasters in our recent times too, like the Krakatoa eruption in 1883. The eruption was so powerful, the ashes that got ejection cooled the planet. I'm sure Bill is not denying the evidence of major catastrophies in the recent times.
  15. Ken: How does Bill know that Noah is unskilled? Bill is thinking that people before us were not as good as us. There are civilizations that existed in the past that exhibited technology that we cannot even understand today. Some of the wooden boats that were built by the Chinese and Europeans had three layers interlocking so they wouldn't twist.
    • Bill: Noah is accused of being unskilled because Bill's ancestors, who were shipwrights in New England, spent their whole learning to make ships, but accuses Noah of not doing so.
    • My Comments: Is Bill using his ancestors inability to build a sustainable ship like the ark, to judge Noah? I'm actually expecting more out of Bill.
  16. Ken: In the horizon problem, how did light and radiation be able to exchange with the rest of the universe? In the model of 15 000 000 000 years or so, it would only be half way.
    • My Comments: Maybe Bill is not very well-versed in Astronomy, so he didn't answer this issue. After all, he did make a number of misstatements.
  17. Bill: If there were only 2000 kinds, we would see 35-40 new species every day. We are losing species instead.
  18. Bill: There are pyramids and human populations older than 4000 years.
    • My Comments: Ken didn't answer during this segment due to Bill having the last rebuttal. There are civilisations before Noah's flood.
  19. Bill: Bring the New Testament into the Old Testament is a little out-of-the-box.
    • My Comments: Ken didn't answer during this segment due to Bill having the last rebuttal. I don't quite understand what Bill is trying to bring across.
  20. Bill: There isn't historical science or observational science. There's only science. Science that is used to aid in Crime Scene Investigation.
    • My Comments: Ken didn't answer during this segment due to Bill having the last rebuttal. I believe I have shown that there is observational science and historical science when it comes to CSI.
  21. Bill: When the scientific community finds an idea that is not tenable, that doesn't work, that doesn't fly, that doesn't hold water, they throw it away. They are delighted. Bill challenges to bring a fossil has swum between layers, and show that somehow the microwave background radiation is not a result of the Big Bang. It will change the world.
    • My Comments: Ken didn't answer during this segment due to Bill having the last rebuttal. In regards to his challenge of having fossils "swimming between layers", how about a human stepping on a trilobite? Is Bill ready to throw out the ideas of trilobites being 521 000 000 years ago?

I am very critical of Bill in this segment. His failure to address Ken's rebuttal properly quite be due to him being more of a science communicator, not so much of a debater. Still, the merits of the rebuttal doesn't seem to be much weight in most sense, especially when it comes to theology, and using his personal experience as an evidence. I could be judging wrongly, but some mentions seem personal. Ken seem objective for most part, highlight evidence of scientific flaws. He did answer a few theological matters.

Questions and Answers

How does creationism account for the celestial bodies, planets, stars and moons moving further and further apart, and what function does that serve in the Grand Design.



Ken here, starts of with a very honest answer, he doesn't know why God made the stars move away. Then he goes on to an evangelistic approach to show the glory of God. Bill responds by highlight the satisfaction of knowing that God created it and not progressing to know why. By just this context alone, Bill makes sense. He then challenges back by asking Ken to predict something based on creation model.

How did the atoms that created the Big Bang get there?


Bill gives an absolute honest answer here. He doesn't know, and he wants to find out. Ken, on the other hand, responds immediately with creation worldview. His responds imply that he doesn't believe in the big bang and everything in the world was created in 6 days. Thus, everything, including intelligence, comes from God. In some sense, Ken's responds still validates Bill's previous statement, that he is just satisfied knowing God created, and not delving further.

The overwhelming majority of people in the scientific community have presented valid physical evidence, such as carbon dating and fossils to support evolutionary theory. What evidence, besides what is the literal Word of the Bible, supports creationism?


Ken highlights the important point that it's not the majority that is the judge of truth. After all, the majority has gotten wrong. It is due to discovery, as mentioned by Bill, that the scientific community changes. Bill is agreeing with Ken's responds to the question. And even more so when Bill mentions about increasing complexity of life because of the sun. There is no observable science to observe how a single cell transit to multi-cell. And he doesn't mention about negative entropy.

How did consciousness come from matter?



As usual, honest to himself, Bill declares he doesn't know. But he goes on to talk about the joy of discovery and ask the audience to find the answer. That's as good as throwing back the question back. Hardly a satisfactory answer to me. To be fair, I'm not too satisfied with Ken's either. His reply, again, emphasizes on his worldview. Highlighting that conciousness comes from God. It still somewhat validates Bill's claim, that he is just satisfied knowing God created, and not delving further. But the next part is interesting. He does make a point that the joy of discovery is only meaningful in the context of what's after death.

What if anything would ever change your mind?


Without context, Ken's answer would seem like a stubborn faith when he mentioned that no one can convince him that the word of God is not true. Here, we can tell his really stumbling over. Next he spends some time telling Bill of what are the things that will change, and what won't. Bill, true to his core, challenges again the need for evidence to change his worldview. His challenge to Ken about predictions from his model seems invalid, as Ken already highlighted some creationist scientist who made discoveries and inventions during the presentation.

Outside of radiometric methods, what scientific evidence supports your view of the age of the earth.


Ken has already proven during the rebuttal that radiometric measurements is not accurate. He makes it a point again during the response to Bill's answer. There's also an erroneous statement that Lord Kelvin calculated 100 000 years old sun, which is actually 30 000 000 years old instead. Bill challenges Ken on the skulls that formed the modern human, which if I were Bill, I would already know that the skull issue has been addressed implicitly by the inaccurate dating methods and the interpretation of evidence. But of course, let's find evidence. I searched around looking for transitional fossils and the most famous case came up, Lucy. This famous fossil has been critiqued that it is not definite proof of missing link. It's not even near complete to start with. When Dr. Johanson was asked how he was sure the knee found 2 Kilometres from Lucy away belonged to Lucy, he replied anatomical similiarity. But dogs and bears are anatomically similiar, yet we don't have dog/bear transitional fossils. Point in, the skulls presented by Bill Nye is not a definitive indicator of human transitional fossils.

Can you reconcile the change in the rate the continents are now drifting, versus how quickly they must've traveled at creation 6000 years ago.


Ken addresses this segment well, using the rate of continental drift as an example of observational science and historical science. We can observe the rate of change today, but to assume it has always been the same in the past, is historical science. Bill explains some continental drift examples that I don't quite catch his point. Even more strangely, what has clocks with slight difference in timings among each other got to do with the question?

What is your Favorite Color?



Ken's observational science approach to the answer and Bill's answer with a intriguing statement. Why is it an irony that green plants reflect green light? Observational science can prove to you the physics of how light works. Why is it a mystery? Bill, are you even serious? But aside from me being critic, I love this humourous segment the most.

How do you balance the theory of evolution with the Second Law of Thermodynamics? (What is the Second Law of Thermodynamics?)


Bill explains well on the 2nd law of thermodynamics and how everything eventually becomes heat. But Ken counters on something very logical. Life doesn't come from energy. To give a grossly simplified example, the reason why you and I are alive is because of oxygen. Yes, plants give oxygen because of energy from the sun, but the energy is converted because of existing life, existing intelligence. That oxygen gives life to other animals, and thus we consume meat and vegetables, which also gives us life. Energy alone doesn't give life. Ken is also right that the entire universe is running down, towards heat death.

Hypothetically, if evidence existed that caused you to have to admit that the Earth was older than 10,000 years, and creation did not occur over six days, would you still believe in God, and the historical Jesus of Nazareth, and that Jesus was the son of God?


Ken avoids answering this question by explaining that there is no such possibility. In the way he presented, he is right. I can't say for sure if avoiding the question is the right thing to do. Bill makes an excellent point that even if there is a disbelief of a certain matter, should be just stop pursuing that knowledge or should we still attempt to find the obvious? This question is much more philosophical than it is science. By now, I'm tired of hearing Bill repeating that we can measure the age of the Earth through obvervance when Ken has repeatedly shown that all dating methods are potentially inaccurate.

Is there room for God in science?


His answer may be subtle, but it's a definite no. What I see here proves Ken's point, that Bill's starting point is naturalism. That's his religion. That question is directed specific to Bill, so referencing others don't really answer the question. Of course, another personal attack on Ken. Ken emphasises again the obversational science and inventions are not the same as historical science and origins.

Do you believe the entire Bible is to be taken literally?


Bill already admits he's not a theologian, so he is validating that his counter argument just doesn't make sense. Ken didn't mention that he will take the Bible and interpret the way he likes it. He is interpreting it according to context. I'm sure Bill wouldn't read a science-fiction book and take it as literal real world events.

Have you ever believed that evolution was accomplished through way of a higher power? (This is the intelligent design question). If so, why or why not? Why couldn't evolution not be accomplished in this way?



Bill asserts that evolution adds complexity. I believe this is in response to Ken's counter argument that energy does not create life, which implicitly means Bill is agreeing with Ken. But evolution doesn't add new information. For example, mating different dog breeds doesn't increase DNA of dogs, but simply a different mixture of genes based on existing genes, creating new breeds. Ken's response is very appropriate when he challenged Bill to show an example of new information arising from what was previously not there.

Name one institution, business or organization other than a church, amusement park, or the Creation Museum that is using any aspect of creationism to produce its product.


I believe the answer is already address when Ken highlights the scientist, who are creationist, making an impact in the world through discoveries and inventions. Bill is still insistent that on the creation model does not have predictive quality.

Since evolution teaches that man is evolving and growing smarter over time, how can you explain the numerous evidences of man's high intelligence in the past?



The right germs has shown up many times in the past, such as the yellow fever. There is still no cure for this disease. But how did we humans defeat this terrible disease? Through other physical means like isolation and vacination. That is because of intelligence. Ken gives an excellent example of how no new information is risen, despite that there is evolution.

What is the one thing, more than anything else upon which you base your beliefs?



Ken takes this final opportunity repeat again the predictions that was made with the creation model, such as the origin of marriage, the origin of language, that kinds will reproduce after its kinds, and so on. He proceeds to seek the truth through the Bible, which, in context, is the eye witness account of creation. Bill makes his point that his religion is naturalism when he mentions that people are a product of the universe. History has shown that we have abandoned many old ideas before, such as abandoning geocentric idea for heliocentric. We should be prepared to abandon ideas if science and society is to progress and if we truely embrace science. His political statement is irrelevant.

My conclusion


In my honest opinion, I see that Ken has put up a very strong compelling case for his stance that observational science is not the same as historical science. Other matters that has been highlighted are that creationist are also scientist, and that the media has falsely portrayed creationist as non-academic people. I disagree at how some questions were answered by Ken, as without context, audience would have certainly misinterpreted it.

I find Bill sometimes in denial. Ken has repeatedly shown predictions made with the creation model. Ken has shown that creationist can move technology forward. Bill just denies it.

  • If creation model is true, we would see dogs reproducing after dogs as predicted. We don't see dogs reproducing something not-dog.
  • If creation model is true, then the dating methods would produce contradictive answers, such as the 45 000 year old wood encased in million years old basalt rock.
  • If creation model is true, we would expect the universe to be logical and consistent. If the current law arose out of randomness, then it is entirely possible another new law can come into play just suddenly, or an existing law can be modified, or even a law can disappear. We built our world based on these consistent laws.
  • If creation model is true, we would expect billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth.
  • If creation model is true, we would find that we humans belong to 1 race.

I hesitate to believe that Bill would change his belief because of evidence. His stance on naturalism is firm. He would use his worldview to find an explanation on historical science, which cannot be observed.

Bill gets personal at several times by making many ideas, specifically Ken's ideas. I find that's not appropriate. We should judge base on the merits of the case, not on the person.

I get the impression part of Bill's objective is to shame anybody who attempts to take Creationistic ideas seriously. Attempting to introduce politics by getting voters to vote creationism out seems like the Galileo controversy, where Galileo was judged by the geocentric majority for suggesting heliocentric view.

While Bill is true to his word, that he will present evidences to support his idea of naturalism, almost all of his evidences are not grounded in certainty. I have shown many examples of evidences refuting his claim. Only few still remains without a satisfactory answer.

I hesitate to declare Ken as the winner, because I don't see this as a competition. This is presentation of 2 men, passionately presenting their ideas forward. There is no absolute right or wrong in this debate. Many claims brought forward should still be subject to overturn as we grasp better understanding in science.

That said, as you can judge from my analysis of this debate, I lean more towards Ken's argument.

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