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August 27th, 2012
11:31 AM ET
Bill Nye slams creationismBy Eric Marrapodi, CNN Belief Blog Co-Editor (CNN)–Famed TV scientist Bill Nye is slamming creationism in a new online video for Big Think titled "Creationism Is Not Appropriate For Children." "Denial of evolution is unique to the United States," Nye begins in a YouTube video posted on Thursday. The video quickly picked up steam over the weekend and as of Monday morning had been viewed more than 1,100,000 times. Nye - a mechanical engineer and television personality best known for his program, "Bill Nye the Science Guy" - said the United States has great capital in scientific knowledge and "when you have a portion of the population that doesn't believe in it, it holds everyone back." "Your world becomes fantastically complicated if you don't believe in evolution," Nye said in the Web video. Creationists are a vast and varied group in the United States. Most creationists believe in the account of the origins of the world as told in the Book of Genesis, the first book of the Bible. CNN’s Belief Blog: The faith angles behind the biggest stories In the creation account, God creates Adam and Eve, the world, and everything in it in six days. For Christians who read the Genesis account literally, or authoritatively as they would say, the six days in the account are literal 24-hour periods and leave no room for evolution. Young Earth creationists use this construct and biblical genealogies to determine the age of the Earth, and typically come up with 6,000 to 10,000 years. Your Take: 5 reactions to Bill Nye's creationism critique The Gallup Poll has been tracking Americans' views on creation and evolution for the past 30 years. In June it released its latest findings, which showed 46% of Americans believed in creationism, 32% believed in evolution guided by God, and 15% believed in atheistic evolution. During the 30 years Gallup has conducted the survey, creationism has remained far and away the most popular answer, with 40% to 47% of Americans surveyed saying they believed that God created humans in their present form at one point within the past 10,000 years. Survey: Nearly half of Americans subscribe to creationist view of human origins "The idea of deep time of billions of years explains so much of the world around us. If you try to ignore that, your worldview becomes crazy, untenable, itself inconsistent," Nye said in the video. "I say to the grownups, if you want to deny evolution and live in your world, that's completely inconsistent with the world we observe, that's fine. But don't make your kids do it. Because we need them. We need scientifically literate voters and taxpayers for the future. We need engineers that can build stuff and solve problems," he said. Creationists' beliefs about the origins of the Earth are often a narrow focus, based in large part on religious beliefs, and while they reject evolution as "just one theory," they often embrace other fields of science and technology. Follow the CNN Belief Blog on Twitter In "The Genesis Flood," the 1961 book that in many ways help launch the Young Earth creationism movement in the United States, the authors write: “Our conclusions must unavoidably be colored by our Biblical presuppositions, and this we plainly acknowledge." Their goal for the book was to harmonize the scientific evidence with the accounts in Genesis of creation and the flood. The idea of creationism has been scorned by the mainstream scientific community since shortly after Darwin introduced "The Origin of Species" in 1859. By 1880, The American Naturalists, a science journal, reported nearly every major university in America was teaching evolution. "In another couple centuries I'm sure that worldview won't even exist. There's no evidence for it. So..." Nye ends his video. soundoff (14,640 Responses)« Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 Next » |
  About this blog
The CNN Belief Blog covers the faith angles of the day's biggest stories, from breaking news to politics to entertainment, fostering a global conversation about the role of religion and belief in readers' lives. It's edited by CNN's Daniel Burke with contributions from Eric Marrapodi and CNN's worldwide news gathering team.  |
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why would anyone NOT accept science? have your faith, believe in god, but accept the science, and reconcile your god, and realize that a parable is not inconsistent w/reality. the world was not created in 7 days. you can still believe in god. expand your world view. just don't deny reality.
The world and everything else was created in 6 days. God rested on the 7th.
Good luck with that stance. Your grandparents would throttle you for it.
The mysteries of God explain that which man can only imagine with their feeble and limited minds. I choose to be a child of God so that I can see and hear my Father.
Luke 8:10 – “And He said, “To you it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to the rest it is given in parables, that ‘Seeing they may not see, And hearing they may not understand.”
Why aren't we hearing much from the 32% tonight?
because they are not threatened. Only the delusional percentage that doesn't believe evolution
I have to ask, why would so many people believe literally in creationism that runs so counter to simple common sense? I can only think that it's a combination of fear and upbringing. I cannot slam people for being afraid, and I am not being patronizing here. Life is terrifying; tragedy, illness and the unpredictable stalk us all and our loved ones. If there is the slightest chance that some superior "being" is pulling the strings and there is some way to pray or placate that terrible uncertainty with faith in the unknown... then it becomes very difficult if not heroic to just toss that off as a fairy tale. People are just not able to thumb their noses at religion when it has been the underpinning of civilization for thousands of years. The most revered people in the world insist that a divine being is working the universe. People worry that by dismissing this all as an old wives' tale, could they be tempting fate, or putting themselves or their loved ones at risk? Can they really bear to live in a universe that is simply run by indifferent laws that originated out of chaos or ... We will never talk people out of creationism because it is pure emotion and care for loved ones that is at the bottom of it, People aren't ready to let go of religion and what its elders preach in favor of a cold and physics-run cosmos.
I think it's reasonable to believe in both. That a superior being(s) exist within this cold and physics-run universe and are capable of manipulating the stuff within it beyond what we can imagine right now. Kind of like "Q" on Star Trek the Next Generation. 🙂
The concept of "strict" creationism is not the same as the general concept that a higher power created the laws of the universe. Science can describing mechanisms that are within our limits of detection. But it can't say much about why the fundamental laws of the universe are what they are. Isn't it a curious thing that every particle must follow a particular order?
Yeah, it is. Science tries to figure out why particles do that.
No, Wayne. I did. Evolution is an absolute fact. There are problems with Darwinian evolution in explaining human abilities and tendencies in religion,math, and art. But Darwinian evolution is limited to individual survival, but there are promising avenues related to group evolution that explain much.
Why is it a problem for evolution to solve (art and etc..) ?
Why would evolution not account for artistic, musical, and mathematical giftedness, among other abilities? Having an innate ability does not ensure that one will become the next Beethoven; greatness in art or any other field is not determined solely by inborn talent.
He needs to create problems in the hope they will never be solved so he can put his foot in the door with God.
@Blame the deserving
Just using the label "darwinian evolution" shows you don't even know what you're talking about.
This is very irresponsible, CNN. This headline implies that Creationism is a serious alternative to Evolution, which it is not. Any scientist worth his degree believes in Evolution. There is no controversy here – please don't stir the pot of nothing just to make people click on your articles.
There are a lot more people a lot more intelligent than Bill Nye who have slammed creationism.
I'm not impressed. Yawn. ;-O
and you are aware of Bill Nye's intellect how?
I can't believe you took the time to type such an absolutely irrelevant statement. I'M not impressed with you. Brain cells matter, stop wasting them.
Having "faith" that others agree with your tunnel vision and supernatural exaggerations is NORMAL.
But "spirituality" is something that can be verified in all people... Maybe the "faith" people need to broaden their horizons and accept that ALL people have the same feelings about things,,, not just them
If you believe in Creationism you bust reject the rules of chemistry and physics.
If you reject the rules of chemistry and physics then God must control and manage every chemical reaction.
If God has to manage every chemical reaction the I can force him to do want.
For example by mixing vinegar and baking soda if force him to manage the process sand manipulate the atoms to make CO2 among other things.
Creationism therefore gives Man dominion over God.
Thats assuming he isn't the one allowing you to make the reaction
If that is the case then all is preordained and therefore abortion is not a sin but is part of God's plan.
Hum hum... this is why you will live forever, right?
Most pregnancies end in the female body rejecting the clump of cells before the woman even knows she is pregnant; ergo, god is the most prevalent abortionist in existence.
Wilson:
No I will live forever because I have a picture hidden in my attic.
Most people who do not believe evolution never seriously read about evolution. Just like most Christian never read about other religions and just "know" their belief is the right one. Pure ignorance. But, there have to be ignorant people in the world, so the wise can prosper. Just like there have to be college dropouts, so the ones with college degrees can make a better living.....
All cultures have evolved with some sort of religion, so religion is part of our evolution, although delusional. I love Bill Nye for saying this, and protecting kids, but still, evolution is not part of religion, but religion is a part of our species' evolutionary history.
Not "believing" in evolution, ("not accepting" would be a better way to phrase it) is a result of educational neglect. I just feel so sad for kids who would do OK in science classes if they had not been so misled. Bill is correct to point this out.
I would love to be there one day as he stands before his LORD to explain his position. I hope he brings along his video.
Why? What are you implying?. Just come out and say it already.
Are you really as dumb as this?
The Lord might say, "You did good in spreading truth to the masses. Welcome to paradise."
God, as presented in the Bible, is a very complicated guy, should he exist.
How do you get those huge antlers up you azz?
He didn't say anything nasty about God, or for that matter, religion.
Don't wait for "one day". Leave today. Rejoin your Lord. You know you want to. Get there early to get a good seat for Bill's eventual appearance.
MANY MANY people of all kinds of religions all over the world, including MILLIONS of xstians here in the USA accept evolution as fact. (Don't think because it's called a theory that it's a "guess" scientists use that word differently.) Go talk to a teacher of biology at a catholic school, or even many protestant schools. IT"S ONLY AN EXTREME ELEMENT THAT DENIES EVOLUTION. You can work this out, even within the framework of the religion in which you currently believe.
My, how disappointing and disturbing this is...a subtle hint of fascism in his comments. This is a excellent example of the reason why it is a good thing that more scientists are not in positions of power. I'm sure if given the opportunity, he would want to legislate the most "scientific" way of parenting.
Actually a pretty good idea, seeing there are over 7 billion and not enough resources.
lol.. yea.. do you know what Fascism is? like really? you're silly... you're silly!!!
It's coming. Get ready for forced reversible sterilizations and parental licensing boards. We're only a few generations away.
Scientists allow you to use a computer, yet you fear them. Oh boy....
Where do all you fu*cking nut bags come from?
nuts
I KNOW! *channelling Craig Ferguson*
Isn't it disturbing how many of them there appear to be? Is this blog representative of the general population?
If you sought God with all your heart you might realize you've been the nut. Jesus will return and things will be done our way.
I'm thinking it must be raining in Tampa and they're all in their hotel rooms using the free wifi to blast the science guy.
Um, no. Your Jeebus said he was coming RIGHT BACK. And that was about 2000 years ago! Will there still be idiots like you just waiting and waiting in the year 10000?
Creationism is nothing but abject stupidity. How do they explain the fossil record?
Millions of tons of pressure from a worldwide flood- next question
It is God's test of their faith.
...and carbon dating ...and gravitational lensing ...and everything the Hubble telescope sees
"Worldwide flood". LOL
"god" can't play "his" game without playing lots of tricks, like surrept-itiously planting those fossils deep in the ground for later generations to discover and develop science to back up their existence. Nope, this "god" has to trip up most of us since "he" doesn't want us in his precious little "heaven" anyway! What a dou-che!
I too get SO FURIOUS with these "&^%*&& nutbags full of "abject stupidity" for spouting creationism, but that's what their church taught them to do, to show their ignorance. WE WOULDN'T MOCK SOMEONE FOR NEVER HAVING LEARNED TO READ AT ALL, we only mock them for not learning to think about what they been taught, (or maybe never have had the opportunity to be taught) BILL NYE was pretty diplomatic compared to all of us commenting on here, and still got in some zingers.
He's alive? D:
Love your comment 'Blame the deserving'. Too much of the controversy focuses on evolution in terms of how life changes. But where life came from is a fantastical mystery that most people ignore. We hear on every nature show about the 'primordial soup' that gave rise to the first living cell. Since there isn't even a rationale model for this so-called theory, it is the scientific equivelant of creationism. Nothing wrong with invoking a creator.
Saying "I don't know" is what a rational person does when they don't know. It's okay. But, if you need to say, "My big fuzzy wuzzy magic fairy tale sky daddy used a magic spell" then go for it.
Other than that is just pretty lame thinking. Goes against the law of Occam's razor, for starters.
Suppose we found the equivalent of an iphone buried on mars. Would you say, gee I don't know how it got there. Must have been some geologic forces that shaped it. Or would you say "Hey, I wonder who made this thing?"
Yes, Bugger, because we know about cell phones. What the fvck is your point and have you any clue how to present an argument?
@Bugger –
I might say, "God Damn! Steve Jobs went everywhere before he kicked-it!"
Sorry. I will clarify for you simple mind. The point is that living things have an amazing amount of complexity and organization. Unlike anything else we see in the Universe. Just like an iphone has an obvious level of complexity and organization. There are currently no natural explanations for how it could have come into existence.
There ARE explanations for abiogenesis, and the details are currently being worked out. However, there is a world of difference between saying "I don't know the mechanism, but we'll eventually figure it out" and "I don't know the mechanism, so rather than try to figure it out, I will choose to believe it is magic."
No model for the primordial soup? You need to read more. Start here http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/originoflife.html
@Bugger – regarding: "There are currently no natural explanations for how it could have come into existence."
No, really, there are natural explanations. That's what science is all about. May I suggest...education?
Sorry Really-O. I've seen that before. It is a who's who of could's and if's. It is a shotgun of models that are not even close to complete, make wild assumptions with nothing but open hand waving and ignore many basic facts that would otherwise undermine the arguments. While it sounds scientific, these theories are fantastical and based on very little actual science. They require a miraculous series of step-wise transitions that are about as chemically likely as an iphone forming by the accidental aggregation of metals and elements in the earths crust.
@Bugger. "The point is that living things have an amazing amount of complexity and organization. Unlike anything else we see in the Universe."
This is a very silly statement. 1) This is a judgement call. Galaxies are pretty complex things, right? 2) Evolution explains the complexity and organization of living things very nicely. Things are complex in just the ways Evolutionary Theory predicts and organized in just the way Evolutionary Theory predicts.
@Bugger –
Really? Are the explanations posited by science more miraculous, wild, and fantastical (that's not a word), and do they involve more open hand waving than explanations posited by illiterate Bronze and Iron Age desert dwellers who didn't know where the sun went at night? Your ignorance is showing, Bugger.
Memyself- you need to read up on some biology. The genetic code, the functionality of proteins, the organization of the cell, and the ability of living systems to replicate and evolve make them unlike anything else in the Universe.
@Bugger – regarding: "The genetic code, the functionality of proteins, the organization of the cell, and the ability of living systems to replicate and evolve make them unlike anything else in the Universe."
Unsupported nonsense. However, at least you do admit that living systems evolve.
Many of you seem to ignore the fact that if life was created, it was done so using the same elements found in the universe. So the fact that it came into existence through physical events is obvious. The question is whether or not those events were random or guided. The difference is whether or not the complexity exceeds a point where it is rationale to propose existence through random processes.
God created the universe.
Many billions of years ago, a life form evolved on a planet not so far distant and their scientists deduced the building blocks for life existed in the universe and from it, new life forms could be created.
These ancient ones populated Mars with life and eventually, due to asteroid events over millions of years, life arrived here on Earth. We are a product of that primeval turbulence.
Therefore, we must worship the Aliens, not God. The Aliens have to worship God.
This is all true because I have faith that it happened just this way.
Joke right?
I knew it! Hitler is with them on Aldebaran, isn't he?!?!?
Creationism is so RIGHT ON, man, all you gotta do is go down to Kentucky and visit the Creation Museum where you'll see how dinosaurs and modern humans lived side by side. TRUE STORY! Just like the Flintstones!
I went there once. I laughed so hard they almost threw me out.
I'm all for free speech, but that museum is an embarrassment to museums. A friend from the UK visited there once and couldn't believe half a country could believe that stuff.
i thought the god particle article was gonna shut this idiot up lol
Religion is the opiate of the masses. Thinking hurts but believing is easy.