Destroying a Creationist Argument with One Word May 19, 2009

Destroying a Creationist Argument with One Word

By Guest Contributor
May 19, 2009

This video from Eric Hovind (Kent Hovind‘s son) encapsulates every Creationist argument in a nutshell.

If you can’t think of the answer, God did it. Their ignorance is proof of God’s work.

How to destroy their argument in a word?

Wikipedia.

You know, if you have a full minute, it might be useful to take five seconds and do a quick Google search.

(Thanks to Sean for the link!)

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What Are Your Thoughts?leave a comment

  • But a magic sky daddy is just so much more elegant and honest an answer than that pesky science nonsense.

  • Wow. I don’t know whether to explode in disbelief or fall off my chair laughing.

  • Reginald Selkirk

    I don’t get it. Is he saying that Noah’s flood caused water to flow uphill?

  • David D.G.

    The more they try to prove their position against all reality, the more stupid and more dishonest they show themselves to be — and their fictional god, too.

    ~David D.G.

  • Zar

    I thought it was going to be Louis Black:

    “Whenever anybody tells me the earth was created in seven days, I reach for a fossil and go, ‘FOSSIL’.”

  • Tony

    So why didn’t 40 days & nights of rain cut the entire surface of the earth down? Why did the flood carve out just that one section?

    I, sadly, live in the same town as these nut jobs. Not realizing when I first moved here that “Dinosaur Adventure Land” was a creationist recruiting & reaffirmation station I made the mistake of taking my son there. Even at a young age he looked at the “guides” presenting creation science like they were missing a bolt or two.

    Here is an example of one of the displays: There is a bowling ball hanging from a cord. You are asked to grab the ball, hold it so it just barely touches your nose so the cord has no slack and then let it go but don’t move! The ball swings away and swings back but doesn’t come up to the same height so you are safe. Why is this? The answer we were given: “God doesn’t want you to get hit by bowling balls so he doesn’t allow it to reach the same spot on each swing. He moves it lower and lower to keep you safe.” I honestly wish I was trying to be funny.

    This same group also teaches that dinosaurs lived with man in harmony. Depending on which tour guide you get the answers to why dinosaurs disappeared varies. The two I remember are “There was not enough room on the ark” and “As man took over more of the earth God realized there was not enough room for the dinosaurs so he put them deep into the Earth.” I still shake my head over that one.

  • I could have refuted this argument with the knowledge I had at my disposal in the second grade.

    How does this kind of ignorance persist?

  • hpavc

    The production value is quite outstanding.

  • Justin jm

    The production value is quite outstanding.

    If it’s flashy, it must be bullsh*t. Not necessarily, but does Hovind not understand the whole “gradual” deal? He seems to think that the Colorado River was always at its current elevation.

  • flawedprefect

    That’s.. sort of a moot point, Mr Mehta. Wikipedia is still not an acceptable reference for a university (or college) grade essay or paper. Also, many who would side with Hovind would ignore or dismiss Wikipedia as being sullied by the “liberal bias”. They just might fire back “well I only believe what I read in the Conservapedia”.

    I hate to quibble, as I tend to agree – creation science is as bunk as a military dormatory, yet quoting anything less than peer reviewed papers, or solid, agreed-upon evidence rather than an online encyclopedia – no matter how accurate it may seem without further research – is a little weak.

    We have facts on our side, but we must find ways of getting over the line rather than nodding amongst ourselves in agreement.

    Of course, I am pessimistic this will ever happen. 😀

  • Cafeeine

    I have to admit that when I saw the title, I heard Bill Hicks in the back of my head saying “Dinosaurs”

  • AnonyMouse

    “To gild refined gold
    To paint the lily
    To throw perfume on the violet
    Is just #^@&ing silly…
    Or something like that.” – Tim Minchin

    Or, from the same poem…

    “Does the idea that there might be knowledge frighten you? Does the idea that one afternoon on Wiki-#^@&ing-pedia might enlighten you frighten you?”

    Both of these came to mind when viewing this video. The Grand Canyon is one of nature’s greatest wonders, created through a beautiful meeting of water, soil, and physics, millions of years before we were born. Yet Creationists want to reduce it to a simple accident – an unintentional byproduct of the mythical flood.

    Why must everything exist for God’s purposes? Why isn’t it enough to exist simply for one’s own sake?

  • River

    I like the sudden unintuitive jump to the Flood, rather than sifting through numerous other options such as ones involving earthquakes.

  • Crux Australis

    No no no. I don’t understand any of that geology stuff on Wikipedia, so it didn’t happen. God did it during the flood.

    That’s what I would say if I were stoopid.

  • Chal

    Flawedprefect, the nice thing about Wikipedia is that it is often written to be understandable by the average person while many peer-reviewed papers are not. Plus it provides a host of references to back up the claims (ideally). It’s a great starting point for people who don’t understand the basics.

    From what I’ve seen though, most creationists won’t accept evidence that contradicts their viewpoint regardless of the source.

  • Crux Australis

    So, how did Mariner Valley on Mars form, which is longer and deeper than The “Grand” Canyon?

  • medussa

    When rafting the Grand Canyon, guides have often told horror stories of trips with creationist guests who insist on being educated about the scenery in accordance with Genesis. Even worse, apparently, are the trips where only some of the guests are creationists, and the rest are science minded folks who want the real story, and the guides have to walk the line of getting their incredible knowledge across without pissing off paying guests. Keep in mind the trips are a week long at minimum, and there are up to 20 guests., which makes for a lot of tension.
    I’ve spoken to National Park rangers who have expressed similar frustrations. I have a hard time understanding why National Parks have to even acknowledge the creationist story. Or if they do, they should be able to list it with other creation stories, like those of the Native Americans, whose story seems much more pertinent to the geographical and social history of any National Park.

  • gmcfly

    Was anyone else expecting him to exclaim, “Checkmate, atheists!”

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P47OC439x88

  • Richard Wade

    I am awed by the dedicated, unrelenting stupidity of Hovind’s argument. So, the Colorado River must have entered the canyon area at the level we see it today relative to the rock above it, and would have had to have flowed uphill to cut its way through all that rock for hundreds of miles, so therefore it was Noah’s flood instead. No further details are needed, the faithful may go back to sleep. (Oh but first, remember to send in that tithing check.)

    This is the problem with people who are raised to believe whatever their authority figures say. Like little children, they think everything is done quickly and easily, and that nothing other than the one thing they’re considering has changed at all. They can only handle extremely simple explanations with only one thing happening at a time.

    Thanks to a ranger, I understood the Guadelupe Uplift when I was 11, the first time I visited the Canyon. I explained it to my 9 year-old friend and he got it. If I remember correctly, the elevation of the river has not changed much, but the whole area slowly rose as the river cut its way through, like a piece of wood being slowly pushed up under a moving saw blade above it.

    An 11 year-old can explain it to a 9 year-old. Hovind has a better vocabulary than a 9 year-old, so he has to be practicing deliberate, work-as-hard-as-if-your-very-life-depends-on-it IGNORANCE.

    I often wonder how many of these dyseducators actually know they’re selling bullshit but just want the money to keep rolling in.

  • thiolsulfate

    It actually hurt to watch that. It physically and mentally hurt.

  • medussa, what are the Native American creation stories about the Grand Canyon? I bet they’re more interesting than “g0dditit”.

  • A lot of people smash Wikipedia for being not scholarly etc. because everyone can edit it, but for a quick job that isn’t a paper for school, it is accurate 95% to 99% of the time. Especially when it comes to common sense like Elementary School science.

  • And even if you don’t want to quote Wikipedia as a source, the good articles on it will lead you to the more substantial source material, so its good for that anyway.

  • Vic

    Great argument. Millions of years of water couldn’t have done it, therefor 40 days of water did it (plus 3 weeks for is to dry up). Not to mention that a world wide flood would have created grand canyons all over the earth.

    Creationists are just as capable as anyone else in looking up the answer, therefore I do not believe that they buy their own story. They are looking straight into the camera and lying. Intellectual dishonesty about your faith will eventually lead to dishonesty in other areas of life.

  • Cypress Green

    Wow! Those creationists are so smart! They can explain the mysteries of the Grand Canyon in one minute, while those foolish scientists write pages and pages of drivel and still don’t get it!

  • Erik

    Crux Australis Says:

    So, how did Mariner Valley on Mars form, which is longer and deeper than The “Grand” Canyon?

    Well, all that water had to go somewhere after 40 days and 40 nights. God flew it to Mars!

  • Reginald Selkirk

    Here is an example of one of the displays: There is a bowling ball hanging from a cord.

    You can find video of Richard Dawkins doing something similar, but he has the integrity to put his confidence in physics, not God.

  • Richard Wade

    Tony, that bowling ball exhibit is amazing. It would be so much more convincing if it was done this way:

    Hang a bowling ball from a cord at the height of your idiot, fundie creationist Dinosaur Adventure Land guide’s face and have him stand with his nose touching the bowling ball. Climb a ladder and pull the ball back as high as the ceiling, keeping the cord stretched tight. Let go of the bowling ball and it will swing back down toward the spot where it was hanging. The bowling ball will not crash into the face of the idiot, fundie creationist Dinosaur Adventure Land guide, pushing his nasal and cheek bones deep into his frontal lobe, splashing brains, blood and cerebral spinal fluid all over the place because God would not want that, and because God never read anything about Galileo’s observing of pendulums, or Newton’s work on gravity and bodies in motion.

    And if you never read stuff like that either, you’ll always be safe from the effects of basic physics too.

  • Ahh of course! Now it makes sense! Noah’s magic flood water can flow uphill, and therefore accounts for this discrepancy.

    Unfortunately for many, the fancy flashy graphic will fool people into thinking this is a serious scientific explanation. That should be a concern for all of us.

  • JSug

    Tony, that bowling ball exhibit is amazing. It would be so much more convincing if it was done this way:

    Carl Sagan used a similar anecdote in his novel, Contact. The main character posits that she would be willing to prove her “faith” in scientific principles by pulling a heavy pendulum back to her nose, letting go, and standing still while it swings back. She then asks the fundamentalist preacher she is talking to if he would be willing to do the same, but take one step forward and say a prayer, trusting God to stop the pendulum before it smashes his face in.

    Back on topic: What amazes me about the video is that you’d think if they can manage to produce all those flashy special effects, they would be smart enough to Google a few papers on the subject of Grand Canyon formation. Willfully ignorant is no way to go through life, son.

  • Robyn

    While, yes, those graphics were nifty…wow. That did nothing but make my brain hurt. Hell, I work with elementary school kids and they know that. GodDAMN.