By now, you might be tempted to pick sides and conclude in favor of one or the other. But there's something I'd like you to know about the recent debate between Bill Nye “the Science Guy” and Ken Ham, founder of Answers in Genesis and the Creation Museum.
Nobody won. Though the debate was well conducted, civil, highly instructive, and illustrative of the struggle for Christian thought in the scientific community, nobody won.
From the beginning, this debate was not set up to declare a winner. I've experienced enough academic or parliamentary debate to know that it has a specific, complex structure and set of rules, which allow it to conclude the truth or falsehood of a given statement (i.e. have a resolution). A skilled judge could follow the arguments presented and refuted by both sides and “flow” the sum total of those arguments to either the affirmative or negative side, without any prior knowledge or bias toward the topic of debate (a concept known as tabula rasa, Latin for “blank slate”).
This debate lacked the specific structure that makes academic debate work: the topic of debate was a question, not a statement that could be declared true or false; a specific set of arguments was not presented and discussed throughout; and the speeches given were not ordered or timed so as to maximize give-and-take on those arguments.
This debate was not mud in the eye for evolutionists or a trouncing for creationists—it was never supposed to be. It was more intellectual theater than academic debate—which is probably just as well, because I've also experienced enough academic debate to know that it can be insufferably boring.
That being the case, I'd like to present a more effective way to react to this debate: treat it as a snapshot of the tension between the scientific and Christian communities, as well as an itemized list of the most important arguments being discussed, and use it as a primer for a comprehensive self-education in this intersection of science and philosophy.
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| Bill's face and Ken's hands -- also very consistent throughout the debate |
Rhetoricians spend a lot of time looking at what students do repeatedly, as a way of helping them realize their shortcomings and improve their technique. The process holds true here: the fundamental issues of this debate are the ones to which the speakers constantly returned. Nye constantly referred to “science as practiced on the outside,” “conventional scientists,” and “the mainstream,” while Ham referred to a perceived exclusion of creationists from the scientific community and portrayed evolution as a religion of naturalism that leads to moral relativism. Nye stressed that the creation model has “no predictive quality” and therefore no relevance to the method of science; Ham repeated that the mechanism of evolution does not introduce new information or function and therefore cannot explain the origin of man.
Perhaps most importantly, Nye's philosophy treats the acquisition of scientific knowledge as the highest goal a man can pursue—meaning “I don't know” is a perfectly acceptable answer—while Ham's philosophy treats the Biblical account as the final and perfect answer, making scientific exploration a function of worship and divine revelation.
It's apparent from this reading that both men have a definite worldview that answers to their own satisfaction the same fundamental questions of philosophy. The war between these worldviews is being fought in battles like radiometric dating methods, geological layers and the fossil record, Lake Missoula, the improbability of the Ark, speciation and genetic “kinds,” the Australian land bridge, the expansion of the universe, and plate tectonics. Wherever you fall on the spectrum of origins beliefs, let this debate serve as a reminder that worldviews and debates should be based on evidence. If you wish to reduce the tension between faith and science, then take some time to study these topics and follow the evidence—all of it—where it leads.
The Nye-Ham debate was fascinating and influential because it pitted the man of faith and the man of science against each other. However, reconciling them should be the aim of every scientific apologetic. They are not at odds, as this debate seemed to suggest; instead, they should be one and the same.
You can watch the Nye-Ham debate at www.debatelive.org for a few more weeks. For further reading, consult the following articles:
Lucas Zellers is a writer and speech coach working in south-eastern Ohio. He competed successfully at the national level in college forensics for two years and has earned a Bachelor's degree in comprehensive communication from Cedarville University.
