Where the Bill Nye v. Ken Ham Debate Went off Track

Take the Big Bang Theory (BBT). It is NOT a scientific explanation of where the universe came from. Instead the BBT assumes the universe exists, then takes the observation that it used to be much smaller and hotter and rolls that back using the natural laws that we observe in the modern universe today. It has tremendous predictive power, it really does. BUT the one thing it does not do, nor can do, is explain where the universe came from. This is what Bill Nye meant when he said he had no idea how “all of this started”. There is no scientific theory that explains HOW the universe came to be…merely what happened to it once it did exist. Why not? Science is the study of nature in the universe. It is therefore INCAPABLE of explaining what happened BEFORE there was a universe.

Similar things happen in evolution. The Theory of Evolution DOES NOT EXPLAIN how life started…merely the observation of what they think happened to it after it came into existence.

Arguments against evolution and BBT need to take this fact into account.

The complication is also that many opposed to evolution and the BBT keep expecting these theories to account for the origin of life and the universe, when they are not designed to do that. Also, all too many scientists speak as thought the BBT explains where the universe came from, or where life came from, when they do not. Why do they do this? It is a combination of ignorance for some, the “religion of science” for others, and pure cash from book sales and speaking fees for others!

Mark Smith, PhD in Physics

Bill Nye the Science Guy has issued another challenge to Ken Ham…

From Bill Nye The Science Guy via his Facebook page 02-11-2014:

“I would challenge him to build a real ark. Instead of trying to fund an ark park, Ken, why not build a real one and take it to sea for a full year? And Ken, if you’re too busy with your flock there in Petersburg, KY, have your most competent parishioners take a shot. Send 8 of your toughest, smartest people to, say, Norfolk, have them design and build a 500 foot wooden boat, load it up with 17,000 pretty good-sized animals, and show us how straightforward it would be to have it remain seaworthy for a year. They have to gather all the food needed locally before they set sail, of course. It’s one more thought experiment that would illustrate how unbelievable the literal story of Noah is…”

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=702975706399455&set=a.165757773…

From Bill Nye The Science Guy: “I would challenge him to build a real ark. Instead of trying to fund an ark park, Ken, why not build a real one and take it to sea for a full year? And Ken, if you’re too busy with your flock there in Petersburg, KY, have your most competent parishioners take a shot. Send 8 of your toughest, smartest people to, say, Norfolk, have them design and build a 500 foot wooden boat, load it up with 17,000 pretty good-sized animals, and show us how straightforward it would be to have it remain seaworthy for a year. They have to gather all the food needed locally before they set sail, of course. It’s one more thought experiment that would illustrate how unbelievable the literal story of Noah is, as translated into modern English. Also, we’d have to stipulate that all humans and animals come ashore alive …”

So I would like to publicly respond to Mr. Nye in the following way.
Bill, during the debate last Tuesday, I asked you this question:
“How do you account for the laws of logic and laws of nature from a naturalistic worldview that excludes the existence of God?”
I challenge you, once again, to provide a rational basis for your worldview. You dodged the question in the debate, and you continue to do so. Until you answer that question, you have no reason to trust your inductions or the uniformity of nature and have no basis to tell us what is right and wrong. I trust those things because I know the God of the universe who created those laws and has promised to uphold them in a uniform way—which is consistent with His perfect character. Indeed, I have a reason for my reasoning.
The battle, as I said more than once in our debate, is not about the evidence. (And it seems even a number of Christian naysayers about the debate still don’t get this vital point, either!)
And besides, Bill, you know this, as I even showed you a “single piece of evidence” of an out of place fossil (using the secularists’ own dating methods)—45,000-year-old wood in 45-million-year-old rock! You said one piece of evidence like this would change your mind—but you willingly ignored it.
Again, why is your assumption that science is possible apart from God reasonable?
Frankly, you are not a “reasonable man” because no reasonable man who claims to be consistent with reality rejects the truth of God’s Word. In fact, the Bible makes it clear in Romans chapter 1 that you know God exists, but you are suppressing that truth in what the Bible calls unrighteousness.
No “reasonable man” believes that reason, emotion, or morality evolved from the random interaction of chemicals over billions of years. Therefore, you have no foundation. You have a blind faith, one which causes you to borrow from the Christian worldview to even make sense of the world around you.
Bill, I urge you to use your God-given reason to respond to God’s Word, such as:
“Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.” (Acts 3:19)
Bill, Noah’s Ark was a real ship—and it is a picture of a real message of salvation from God’s judgment on man’s sin, including yours. (And the answers to your questions about the seaworthiness of the Ark and how it could have been built are on our website; also AiG is not a church and so we don’t have parishioners.) Just as Noah and his family went through the door of the Ark to be saved, we need to go through the door of our Ark of Salvation.
Jesus Christ said, “I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.” (John 10:9)

I have some acquaintances who are atheists and they jumped on the “no death before the fall” argument by brining up the death of the plants that Adam ate for food. (You have to admit that the idea of an apple being eaten, staying alive through the digestive tract, and then reconstituting itself is kind of humorous.) The fall brought death to mankind is probably more accurate.

Ron, Romans 5 makes clear that human death began at the Fall, but Romans 8:19–22 seems to go further in inculpating Adam with all of the “pain,” “frustration,” and “corruption” of the created realm generally. That’s why Ham, Mortenson, and others at AiG are hesitant to accept the solution you offered.

The alternative solution that AiG offers to the problem you raised is that plants are never described in Scripture either as “living” or as “dying.” While the scientific community speaks commonly of the ‘death’ of ‘living’ plants, the Scriptures seem to define ‘living things’ a bit more narrowly, restricting the terms to animal life. Since the consumption an apple does not involve “pain,” “frustration,” “corruption,” or “death,” they would argue, it is not the result of the Fall; however, the death of an animal would involve all of those things, and thus must derive from the Fall.

It is not just plants that create a problem for YEC. There are at least some and probably numerous living organisms from insects on down that are designed to live less than a day.

Well Greg, we know that the nature of animals was different before the fall and will be different in the eternal state, so perhaps death passed upon this part of creation in the same way it passed upon mankind.

That may be the answer Chip but it is a very sticky problem. Our sophisticated ecosystem requires death or it gets out of balance quickly. I read once but forget where about what would happen within a day or two if there was not constant death especially at the micro-organism level. It is of course possible that an entirely different ecosystem existed before the fall and God completely reengineered it. I suppose Ham would have to believe that.

Greg,

I think Chip’s answer may account for some of the tension here. Still, your point is valid that some zoological micro-organisms seem designed to live and to die in very short cycles. Assuming for sake of argument that this was true prior to the fall, I think the young earth creationist can still make valid appeal to the definition of life. The lowest “order” of “living thing” described in Scripture is “creeping things.” Extending that definition to amoebas and bacteria (etc.) remains, for me at least, an open question—they represent a category that was largely unknown by the early Scripture writers. The line of demarcation between zoological micro-organisms and botanical micro-organisms is very elusive, even among secular scientists. I think that it’s at least reasonable to suggest that some of the micro-‘animals’ accepted in the scientific community are not in the biblical category of ‘living things.’

Unfortunately, the Bible doesn’t give us as clean a definition as we’d like to have. At the very minimum, though, I would say that there was no ‘death’ occurring that fits Paul’s definition of “pain,” “frustration,” and “corruption.” We have to account for Romans 8:19-22 at some level, certainly.

There are at least some and probably numerous living organisms from insects on down that are designed to live less than a day.

How did you discover this information?

Larry, it is not hard at all to research life spans of animals. I must be missing what you are getting at.

Larry, it is not hard at all to research life spans of animals. I must be missing what you are getting at.

You said it was “designed” that way, and I was wondering how you know it was designed that way vs. being that way because of the fall.

I think Mark has well addressed the issue here, and he includes the word “seems” before design, which I think is a much better way to put it. I would simply suggest that we cannot necessarily tell how something was “designed” per se. If we doubt that, consider man. He was designed to be perfect. Yet we can research that and find out he isn’t. If we base our conclusion only on what we can see, we miss the design.

first example of a common organism with a short lifespan would be the mayfly. one species lives as a mature adult for only 5 minutes.

http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/walker/ufbir/chapters/chapter_37.shtml

[Larry]

There are at least some and probably numerous living organisms from insects on down that are designed to live less than a day.

How did you discover this information?

first example of a common organism with a short lifespan would be the mayfly. one species lives as a mature adult for only 5 minutes.

Thanks for that Chris, but it doesn’t answer the question I was asking, which is about design. Seeing that something dies in five minutes now says nothing about what it was designed to do.

Larry, I agree that it’s impossible to answer that theoretical question. All I can say is that the mayfly seems well-suited to its short lifespan as there is no shortage of this insect. And I don’t think anyone can imagine how the mayfly would have worked with a lifespan that would surely have had to be many times longer if there truly was no death in Eden.