Teaching Creationism is Child Abuse

[rob19]

Lawrence Krauss

[Spesh]

He makes a good point.

[phins_4_ever]

"Education should not validate ignorance but to overcome it"

Well said.

Of course the concern is that more and more politician holding the idea that earth is only 6000 years old getting elected. Sometimes I have the feeling we are going backwards in our evolution as a species.

[Statler Waldorf]

Problems with the video…

1. If the evidence was really on the side of the old earthier, then why are they so afraid of people teaching children the Earth is young? After all, the evidence will speak for itself and they will figure out the right answer won’t they? The truth of the matter is that there are very compelling arguments that can be made for a young earth, but rather than letting everyone hear these arguments they want to shut the debate down. Beware of the sound of one hand clapping.
2. His comparison between the age of the Earth and the width of United States is fallacious because length and width can be empirically measured, the age of the Earth cannot. False Analogy.
3. He is validating ignorance by not allowing the children to hear both sides of a very important scientific debate.
4. The Earth’s orbit around the sun can be empirically verified (although absolute motion is actually not completely accurate), the age of the Earth cannot be empirically verified, why do old-earthers always have to resort to fallacious analogies to try and prove their point?
5. Teaching both sides of an argument is in no way “watering down” the quality of education, it actually is enhancing it because it teaches critical thinking.
6. Evolution is not the basis of modern biology, that’s a complete canard; all of our modern discoveries in Biology could have been made without believing all life on Earth came from a single common ancestor.
7. The advancement of technology and bio-technology has nothing to do with the age of the Earth; after all, the MRI machine was invented by someone who believed the Earth was 6,000 years old.
8. He never makes a case as to why teaching children creation science is child abuse, even if everything he said were true (which it isn’t), he never explains why that makes it child abuse. Pretty lame video really.

[tylerdolphin]

Id say the Old Earth view most certainly has empirical evidence to support it. Quite a large amount of it actually.

[Statler Waldorf]

Id say the Old Earth view most certainly has empirical evidence to support it. Quite a large amount of it actually.

I don’t think you understood what I meant; age is not an empirically measurable property. The only way to empirically observe the age of something is to directly observe the point in time at which it began to exist. Now of course we cannot do that with the Earth if it is thousands of years old, and even much less if it is billions of years old. So the age of the earth must be inferred, or extrapolated from other observable rates and processes. This extrapolation is not a form of empirical science; it is more of a historical science and comes with a lot of “assumption baggage”.

[phins_4_ever]

Problems with the video…

1. If the evidence was really on the side of the old earthier, then why are they so afraid of people teaching children the Earth is young? After all, the evidence will speak for itself and they will figure out the right answer won’t they? The truth of the matter is that there are very compelling arguments that can be made for a young earth, but rather than letting everyone hear these arguments they want to shut the debate down. Beware of the sound of one hand clapping.

I think the fear comes from knowing that if you teach kids the wrong thing you make them dumber and more vulnerable to brainwashing which is of course to your advantage. And teaching our children that the earth is only 6000 years is a step back into the middle ages and back beyond. We essentially would stop our evolution and move backwards. It may be again to your advantage because than people like you could spread the BS uncontested.

[SkapePhin]

I don’t think you understood what I meant; age is not an empirically measurable property. The only way to empirically observe the age of something is to directly observe the point in time at which it began to exist. Now of course we cannot do that with the Earth if it is thousands of years old, and even much less if it is billions of years old. So the age of the earth must be inferred, or extrapolated from other observable rates and processes. This extrapolation is not a form of empirical science; it is more of a historical science and comes with a lot of “assumption baggage”.

Radio carbon dating is an empirical measurement. Yes, there are instances when fires can throw off the measurement, but for the most part, this method is an empirical method.

[SkapePhin]

There is nothing that annoys me more than creationists. In all honesty, if Christians would remove this creationist strain from their midst, they would be a lot more popular. There is nothing worse than going to church and listening to the pastor pretend to be a scientist and spout off garbage to "debunk" evolution.

I am not sure if these pastors are cognizant of the lies and half truths they are spreading to their ministry, or if they truly believe what they are saying. Being that many of these pastors are rather intelligent in other facets of their life, I would have to believe they know the falsities of their claims, but keep spreading the misinformation to not diminish the validity of the Word.

[Spesh]

Radio carbon dating is an empirical measurement. Yes, there are instances when fires can throw off the measurement, but for the most part, this method is an empirical method.

According to Statler, unless your actually there watching it happen without blinking, events cannot be measured in time. Dont look at your watch either, that ruins it as well.