I wish I still lived in Minnesota ...

But Ham and the Young Earth Fundies and their Museum accept the main claim of Darwinism: species mutability. In fact, the museum displays lots of evolution to account for species.

Look what Darwin hath wrought!

And now Faux News is going to add this pile of horseshit to its own pile of horseshit. Yippie!

With so much shit, they should be able to make the “Ark Encounter” a real olfactory experience.

Oh yeah. I was working out at the town gym this morning, and recently they remodeled and put in a row of large panel displays. I usually find them distracting while I'm trying to work up a sweat, but when FOX flashed up "CREATION MUSEUM", various quotes about what a silly trashload the place is, and then Ken Ham's smiling face -- I think he gives me the creeps worse when he's smiling -- I wondered: "WHAT is this?" No sound on the gym TVs, no subtitles on the commercial.

Thanks to the magic carpet of Google, now I know, sorry I asked. Ham's playing the "everybody's picking on us" card. Which I guess is a fairly good pitch on their target audience.

As Skip Roper and Mojo Nixon once exclaimed: "A turd so big, it had other, little turds orbiting around it!"

Is this the same John Scalzi who wrote Old Man's War? If so, a wonderful writer. If not, then we have TWO John Scalzis who are wonderful writers.

You do know snow is in the forecast here in MN, don't you?

Oops, should have followed more of the links. It is indeed the same man. I have all his books, and they are entertaining as hell.

Imagine, if you will, a load of horseshit.

Hee-hee! I contributed to the fund he set up a few years ago to visit that pile of horseshit. He donated all of it to NCSE, I believe. :)

Yes, it is the same John Scalzi. I read what he writes, wishing I'd said that.

And if I were in the United States - hell, if I were in the western hemisphere - I'd so be there for that.

I dunno-I went to foxnews and searched for "museum" and got this:
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/04/12/icelands-penis-museum-finally-gets-human-specimen/
but nothing about Ken Ham's museum.

Yeah, Scalzi and Stevenson (Cryptonomicron) have some truly elegant turns of phrase. I particularly liked one of the introductions of a character in Cryptonomicron, that described every living thing as a stupendous badass, because anything that wasn't a stupendous badass was eaten by a stupendous badass.

Stephenson seems to toss those things offhand, and some of them are really neat. In Cryptonomicon, he described a fax machine as "sounding like a bird in a coffee can". Yeah, I wish I could think those things up too.

Ray Martinez said: But Ham and the Young Earth Fundies and their Museum accept the main claim of Darwinism: species mutability. In fact, the museum displays lots of evolution to account for species. Look what Darwin hath wrought!

Flint said: Stephenson seems to toss those things offhand, and some of them are really neat. In Cryptonomicon, he described a fax machine as "sounding like a bird in a coffee can". Yeah, I wish I could think those things up too.

I browsed through Scalzi's photo tour. It's more extensive than PZ's tour reporting. I hadn't been aware of the actual timeline of creation before. It's a little hard to read, but it looks like Noah's flood happened in about 2400BC (the "Catastrophe" part), and the Towel of Babel about 100 years later (the "Confusion" part).

That's pretty impressive, in that the ancient Egyptians, Minoans, Chinese, Indians, and Sumerians don't seem to have noticed this global flood. You would think that the Egyptian pyramids would have shown some signs of inundation.

It's also impressive that within 100 to 150 years, 8 people from the Ark managed to rebuild the city of Babel enough to build a tower to rival God himself. Let's see. Maybe someone has already done this. But if we assume a generation of 20 years, starting with 4 women, assuming about 20,000 people in the city of Babel (a society large enough to support a major building project on the scale of the Pyramids), then every woman would have had to give birth to 10 to 30 children every 20 years over a fertile lifetime of 100 years. (Assuming an infant mortality rate of about 50% (a rough estimate for the Bronze age), and half of the children were males.) Assuming an actual fertile life span of about 30 years, and we're looking at about 50-100 kids per woman in just under 15 years, or about 3 to 6 kids every year per woman. Just rough back-of-the-napkin estimates.

Rather impressive. I had no idea that Noah's family was so damn fertile. :-)

Hmm... My statistics are probably very rusty. :-)

Rather impressive. I had no idea that Noah’s family was so damn fertile. :-)

Scott F said: That's pretty impressive, in that the ancient Egyptians, Minoans, Chinese, Indians, and Sumerians don't seem to have noticed this global flood. You would think that the Egyptian pyramids would have shown some signs of inundation.

Scott F said: That’s pretty impressive, in that the ancient Egyptians, Minoans, Chinese, Indians, and Sumerians don’t seem to have noticed this global flood. You would think that the Egyptian pyramids would have shown some signs of inundation.

raven said:

Scott F said: That’s pretty impressive, in that the ancient Egyptians, Minoans, Chinese, Indians, and Sumerians don’t seem to have noticed this global flood. You would think that the Egyptian pyramids would have shown some signs of inundation.

Ham's timelines are pretty funny. 2500 BCE The Egyptians start building pyramids. 2400 BCE God destroys the biosphere and kills all but 8 people in a Flood. 2300 BCE The Egyptians are still building pyramids, not realizing that there was a Flood and that they are, in fact, dead.

raven said:

Scott F said: That’s pretty impressive, in that the ancient Egyptians, Minoans, Chinese, Indians, and Sumerians don’t seem to have noticed this global flood. You would think that the Egyptian pyramids would have shown some signs of inundation.

Ham's timelines are pretty funny. 2500 BCE The Egyptians start building pyramids. 2400 BCE God destroys the biosphere and kills all but 8 people in a Flood. 2300 BCE The Egyptians are still building pyramids, not realizing that there was a Flood and that they are, in fact, dead.

Speaking of really big floods and really big wooden boats - did you know that Noah had really big wooden cranes?

Oh yeah.

Here's what AiG said last week, and I quote, "Even in the small details, the AiG web team strives to preserve biblical accuracy as far as possible. In this case, the web banner for the Ark Encounter site upholds what we believe to be an accurate portrayal of the Ark’s construction."

Please note the giant cranes at arkencounter.com (I don't think the Egyptians, or the Romans, or Medieval Europeans, built wooden cranes that big! Maybe they did, and I just don't have good engineering sense.)

Even in this small detail, apparently, AiG is striving to preserve biblical accuracy by an accurate portrayal of the Ark's construction.

I wonder if they will use such wooden cranes in their reconstruction? I wonder if their reconstruct will float? Will it be seaworthy in super hurricane seas? I hope so.

Flint said: Stephenson seems to toss those things offhand, and some of them are really neat. In Cryptonomicon, he described a fax machine as "sounding like a bird in a coffee can". Yeah, I wish I could think those things up too.

anon said: You do know snow is in the forecast here in MN, don't you?

That was one hilarious slideshow, and all the comments were great too. Now if I could only stop laughing!

RBH said:

anon said: You do know snow is in the forecast here in MN, don't you?

When I lived there, back in the Dark Ages, there were four seasons: Spring (July 3), Summer (July 4), Autumn (July 5), and Winter (all the rest). :)

Flint said:

RBH said:

anon said: You do know snow is in the forecast here in MN, don't you?

When I lived there, back in the Dark Ages, there were four seasons: Spring (July 3), Summer (July 4), Autumn (July 5), and Winter (all the rest). :)

Dig it. Where I grew up, they used to say that they could only go on a picnic those years when summer fell on a weekend.

Here's the most memorable opening line I've come across in any novel I have read published since 1980, William Gibson's "Neuromancer", published appropriately enough in 1984:

"The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel."

You can read an extended excerpt from the first chapter here:

http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/books/neuromancer.asp

John Kwok said: Here's the most memorable opening line I've come across in any novel I have read published since 1980, William Gibson's "Neuromancer", published appropriately enough in 1984: "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel." You can read an extended excerpt from the first chapter here: http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/books/neuromancer.asp

David Fickett-Wilbar said: Here in New England we have the extra seasons that take up part of what others would call spring: mud and pothole seasons.

W. H. Heydt said:

John Kwok said: Here's the most memorable opening line I've come across in any novel I have read published since 1980, William Gibson's "Neuromancer", published appropriately enough in 1984: "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel."

...and in 50 years or so, almost no one will know what he's talking about since digital TVs don't look the way he describes.