Bill Nye Debates Creationist Ken Ham Live 2/4/2014

we get the same crap up north too.

I'm just pointing out the obvious.

Jassik has had a history of arguing for the sake of arguing and disagreeing just for the sake of disagreeing.

But regardless, I am just giving Keityan something to consider, because I'm sure he is starting to get aggregated by that.

I'm generalizing. I apologize if saying "Right" is too general or used as an understanding of a current method that works under whatever conditions we have/know about right now. I know we might get some additional layer of depth or some caveat or sometimes even have to change our entire understanding about something but for everyday purposes, I don't see a problem with saying "right". Would it be better if I said "we use science to become more informed"?

We use science because it's fun!

I kinda disregarded college experiences because I still considered myself a kid when I was in college, but the same thing happens in the north.

The university cafeteria was known as the Commons. There were usually posters all over the Commons advertising the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and other religious clubs and cliques. We had several missionaries who traveled around the Commons in pairs and tried to convert people. They cared not even a little bit if you were wearing headphones, reading a book, or had homework/studying open on the table in front of you. If you were in the Commons, you were subject to be approached by missionaries.

I once even got cornered in the girls' Commons bathroom by a pair of female missionaries who had apparently followed me in to preach the good word while I attended nature's call. >.>

There was also a group of older gentlemen who would stand on the sidewalks around campus and give tiny, condensed versions of the New Testament to anyone who walked by.

After leaving college, all that nonsense dropped down to basically just family members and my one coworker.

Now, as to the question of whether girls are more often targeted, I don't know. But I do know that my husband went to the same college as me and people very rarely bothered him on it. I couldn't even eat lunch in the Commons, I'd buy it there and then go find an empty hallway to eat in to avoid the missionaries (and to avoid the sheer noise of hundreds of students stuffed into one room), but he never had such trouble. But that's not necessarily a gender thing, I might just look more approachable in general. Who even knows.

All in all, I try to respect other peoples' beliefs if they respect my non-belief. I have gotten rude with my dad a few times because he cannot respect my non-belief, but that's to be expected. He truly believes that I am going to burn in hell and he'll try just about anything to protect his "baby girl" from that, but when you are on the receiving end of paranoid parental fear, it's just way too easy to get snippy towards your loved ones after awhile.

mathematical!

Well on its way to a feminism thread. We'll have to see if the environment selects for this advantageous trait.

I'd like to see you carry "scientifically test" anything without intrinsically asking a basic yes/no question. What you're saying that you don't need positive or negative controls for any experiment that you'll ever do.

This is why scientists will look at the broad picture before going into the specifics and deduce their way down. You see, I didn't jump directly to the conclusion that my mold created anti-microbial agents because that's less likely event than a pH sensitivity. I also wouldn't checked whether it was targeting its cell membrane, cell wall, ribosomes, DNA, polymerases etc before the macroscopic aspects were known.


You're defining a scientific theory. Theories are not proven or disproven. Theories are based on facts. The facts explain why something happens. It's a model of understanding. I now realize why you are arguing so avidly, you're arguing about the wrong definition. You're arguing for scientific theory not science.

Science isn't only about the theories. It's about the process of how to test and approach problems. That's why science depends on experimental design. You use experimental design in order to develop theories and test them. This is why I mention to you that all science is based on experimental design based on proving/disproving hypothesis.

I think I hit the nail on the head. Objections?

The only person I can't criticize religion with is my crazy uncle and my lone grandmother. Uncle went to seminary and got thrown out or something, he'll never tell anyone why he didn't cut it.

Guys family but hes been crazy ever since. All we know is he had a nervous breakdown and got institutionalized afterwards and has been on meds ever since. When he's off the meds you know immediately from some of the crazy ***he goes on about.

As for grandma, well, she's just done too much for me to throw that burden on her. I couldn't break her heart like that. Even my polemics has limitations.

Well, it's an argument just not a particularly salient one. We do know the conditions of early earth based on very real observations that can be made today. Scientists do rely on the assumption that laws and processes did work the same way back then as they do now (Uniformitarianism), but it's an assumption that needs to be made to be able to study literally anything. For example, what's the point of studying antibiotic resistance in one plate of bacteria if we can't assume that the same processes are occurring in another plate of identical bacteria? There's nothing to be gained from a non-parsimonious explanation of the past (or present) that includes mysterious or unknown forces we have yet to encounter.

I've been dicking around on that creation website (STILL TRAPPED S.O.S.) and the point that Ham is trying to drive home is this made-up distinction between observational and "historical" or "origins" science exemplified here:
If you're familiar with scientific inquiry at all, you know that the above distinction is complete and utter crap. That godless heathen, PZ Meyers, puts it simply in his blog: "All scientific evidence is observational." (http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/07/27/historical-and-observational-science/) The funny thing is Ham's own idea of 'observational evidence onry' discredits the basic fundamentals of creationism pretty much entirely.

I hate hate hate that when I googled the term 'historical science', which I had to because it's a term completely foreign to modern science, I saw multiple news outlets had summarized the debate and had included those same made-up terms. Great, now some *** creationist terminology is muddying up the already abysmal scientific literacy of the general public. As much as I like Bill Nye as a great public science figure (and all-around interesting person), I really think he did a disservice to science in general by even entertaining creationism as worthy of scientific debate and giving this clown a grand stage with which to poison the public well.

On the side, here is how you rebuttal "It's only a theory" to your christian friends.

For some of you that are confused with the concept "scientific theory" and how many people incorrectly use the rebuttal "It's only a theory". Here is something something that you should know and how you rebuttal this argument.

Scientific Theory, as the word suggests, is based on two aspects.

1. Science is the process of asking questions and answering questions. As I have said before, at its most basic form, involves asking a question (hypothesis) and answering them with a basic yes/no question. This is how science is conducted: by constantly asking questions and answering them.

2. Theory is how you "understand" a concept. When we think of Newton's Theory of gravity, we aren't stating whether the gravity works or not. No, that's called a Law. (Have you ever noticed that you had the "Laws of Thermodynamics" and others are such as "Theory of Relativity?") Well, here's the distinction: Theories predict and help you understand why things work. Laws on the other-hand are constantly observable facts. There are things that you see, they are facts that support theories.

If we look at Newton's Theory of Gravity, he presents to us how he understands how things fall when you drop them. He explains it mathematically. He explains how this works. How did do it? By lots of trial and error and experiments. That process of asking questions and answering them is the scientific process. Thus, Newton's Theory of Gravity is known as a Scientific Theory. It is because he gained his understanding of gravity through experimentation.

Thus, when someone tells you "it's only a theory" you can tell them that they got the entire definition of "theory" wrong.

Interestingly enough, creation.com, a website that is steadily sapping my strength and gelatinizing my brain matter, offers a list of "bad arguments" (this broke my irony meter) that creationists should avoid and evolution as "only a theory" is included. Pretty basic rebuttal using the dictionary definition of the word, but I found the idea of forbidden arguments very amusing.

we're going to lose you to that site, aren't we?

AVENGE MY DEATH

I will! those damn creationists won't get the better of me.

Ok, I'm not clicking on any more of your links >.> From your link I went to "death is the result of sin" which then gave me this beauty


Edit >.>

I guess I'll throw in...

1.) I remember Fellowship of Christian Athletes being overwhelmingly female (and primarily Baptists) in HS, and they were usually the ones accosting others. There were only a handful of Catholics and Lutherans, and only one Jewish family. For some inexplicable reason, we were prodded the most because of their lack of understanding of other denominations, I assume.

2.) I made the mistake of refusing to pray with the collective a couple of times (even though prayer before something as insignificant as a sport, pageant, or recital seemed more like some unnecessary, over-the-top, and a superficial opportunity to display one's "devotion" with an audience's presence), and was pestered about it endlessly. I explained myself multiple times, and apparently, not engaging in what you might perceive as a superficial act automatically puts you on par with an atheist. Who knew?

3.) We had the usual solicitation on campus from Chi Alpha and such, but there was one organization specifically, that seemed to only approach girls. I think they weren't even an affiliate to the college in any capacity, just some random, non-denominational church seeking students. I was never approached by any religiously affiliated club on campus while with a guy though, which I found suspect.


4.) We had a screamingly similar with my boss's wife while I was pregnant. Apparently, there is more merit in having a shotgun wedding at age seventeen in the 1970's than there is to be unwed and pregnant in your late-twenties? I knew that she was religious beforehand, but really pushed during that period. My boss apologized endlessly for a few weeks after that.


5.) Same, and just to add, the Sunday crowd is always the rudest, and never seem to realize that when they see an opportunity to save some poor soul they are taking away time from other customers. They get overly offended by excusing yourself, even if you're doing it in the nicest possible way. (That grit your teeth grin!)

6.) We did have one funny, little incident with a couple of Morman missionaries who stumbled upon a Saturday barbecue among our clan! A gaggle of us were in the front yard with kiddos when they approached us. After exchanging the usual pleasantries and reiterating a couple of times that we are "spiritually fulfilled" in one way or another, one of the guys (who was under the influence and a practicing Catholic) spotted this going down during a pee break and came barreling out the front door with a ***-eating grin. He slung his arms around two of us (four gals total and six kiddos acting an ***) and slurred, "Do you practice 'The Word'?"

It scared them off.

If there is no death... what did they eat? It KILLS plants when you eat them...



Edit: didn't see your edit ^^ but you covered that lol.

Huh, well then. That was... something. Now if you will excuse me.Think I'm done with that website anyway. It gets pretty monotonous. Like Kincard has pointed out earlier, it's obvious from many of their articles that these people are familiar enough with the topics to build up credible-sounding writings but they feign ignorance or obtuseness on any contrary evidence or explanations. Instead of building creationism up (a feat they're incapable of given the complete lack of supporting evidence), they aim to falsely attack non-creationist thinking to bring it down to creationism's level so they can point at the two as equal and competing theories. False equivalence on a grander scale.

I feel like I understand the opposition more thoroughly now, but I also feel like that makes me despise them all that much more.

I'm defining science as the scientific method, not a scientific theory. It's the methodology that defines it, not the conclusions.


Nope, but I've made my point.


I have a history of arguing with demonstrably false or misinformed statements. And, yes, your statements are antagonistic.

Well, when you are dealing with people who are utterly convinced in their beliefs of the One Creator or whatever, there is only one thing you can say the leave it at that:

"I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible that you may be mistaken."

Or you can replace miracles and other mysteries with "Magic", "Wizards" and possibly "Sexy Vampires" and try to use the exact same arguments back on those creationists and see how they react. It would make great fiction stories.

Why do you specifically want to criticize religion?

I get that there are times when religion is an unholy detriment. A girl I grew up with who was 2 years older than me developed cancer when she was a teenager and her father, who was both a devout Presbyterian and a physician (actually my physician according to hospital paperwork), opted for prayer instead of the aggressive and radical treatment she needed. She needed to be at St. Jude's Hospital, actually, but he basically waited until she was on death's door to fill out the paperwork and it was far too late by that point. I remember sitting vigil at her bedside while she breathed her last few hundred breaths in a coma. I will never forgive her family for this travesty.

However, outside of really extreme examples like that, is it any better to hassle someone for believing in Jeebus than to be hassled for not doing so? I have nothing but contempt for the overwhelming majority of religions, especially Zoroastrian faiths, but most people I know would never go to the extreme I described above. My mother has been a fairly devout Catholic her entire life and has become moreso since developing a long series of health problems. She bugs me from time to time about not having faith (she doesn't grasp that I actually do, just not in her deus), but I refuse to tell her that her beliefs are twaddle.

If nothing else, how do I know? Yeah, I feel pretty confident saying that bushes burn when aflame, the sun never stood still, and resurrection is a myth straight out of the collective unconscious, but my particular faith doesn't preclude the possibility of deities and I don't see why I should get snippy with someone if their faith brings no harm. I have little regard for Wiccan practice, but their Rede is a damned good aphorism and is arguably right up there with the Golden Rule. In most people's daily lives, it really doesn't matter if they recognize that lightning is a rapid burst of high-energy electrons or Jupiter's spears. It's tiresome when someone thanks their deus for something, especially because it offends my humanism, but what does it profit me to try to tear that behavior down?

Great, I also agree that the methodology is what defines it. This is based on hypothesis testing which means that you have to ask questions and prove and disprove them to generate enough facts and laws to support a theory (and btw, theories are not facts but what you get from your experiments are). This is why science is based on proving and disproving, because by design, this is how to create experiments. You ask a question, you make an educated guess, you test it, you get data. The type of data you get depends on the question that you ask. This data is used as binary proofs that will satisfy or fail to satisfy your hypothesis. Data are facts.

You're basically claiming that you can create data without asking a hypothesis when you claim that there is no proving/disproving. That is no longer the scientific method in this case. You can't even answer a single question relevant to science with your type of viewpoint.

I'd argue the significant results are the unexpected ones. The results of an experiment are more important when they are outside of your supposed yes/no scenario.

I remember when I was taking my undergraduate statistics classes and there was one professor who, just to make a point, would occasionally take popular scientific studies and essentially tear them apart. He would point out flaws in the studies and how certain aspects didn't follow the laws of probability, didn't accurately represent population data, and/or didn't use correct methods of sampling. That, coupled with examples of how observational studies implied causation when that cannot legitimately be done, really opened my eyes to how much even scientists with doctorates don't understand the statistical science off which they're basing their conclusions.

I've spoken with quite a few people who read a scientific study and accept it as law, all without even looking into how the study was performed or how conclusions were reached. In reality, these people are not only accepting scientific studies with blind faith, they're actively forming opinions about the world based upon things they don't understand. Also, if a scientist reaches a conclusion that not only supports his or her hypothesis but also provides a path to more research and grant money, why would he or she take the time to question the result?

My point is not that science is bad. I am amazed to see what types of things scientists are discovering and fully endorse their search. I just think there needs to be far more skepticism in the process for all involved.

Watched some women nearly get attacked outside of the DC metro Planned Parenthood today.

It's *** up when the women who go in for medical treatment have to be escorted by security.

Also: first time ever driving in D.C., that was whack.

and there's a severe lack of open wifi networks.

Maybe you should look into the study(s) somebody earlier mentioned that showed religious people to be less intelligent! I only have a vague recollection of one and IIRC, it was a meta-analysis..

Binary science! Please someone tell my mentor about this...

In all seriousness though your examples of experimental design are rather simplistic. It would be nice if we could set up experiments as simple yes / no questions but frequently the answer to the query is maybe. Also I would never dare to call bioinformatics binary as there are so many possible results depending on what thresholds you set. Finally, my favorite field, immunofluorescent analysis of tissue is absolutely not binary. If the only information you gather from a triple stain is 'is my protein of interest present' then you are wasting a lot of data! I suppose you could argue that every experiment is closer to 100 binary questions but once again that pesky maybe tends to be the answer too often.

I read a study by Yale that showed that members of the Tea Party are more likely to understand scientific issues than the rest of the population. If you want something to support your argument about nearly any topic, there's probably a scientific study to back you up. I'll look at that study that was mentioned and see what I think of it.