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Quantumaniac Article Provokes Response from Ken Ham

A recent article that I posted about the Creation Museum seems to have parked a good deal of controversy amongst Creationist believers - even provoking a response (click to read) from the President of the Creation Museum himself, Mr. Ken Ham. Despite our differences in belief, I commend Ham’s graciousness in responding to my article. Mr. Ham, if you or an associate are reading this, please read to the end - I’d like to take you up on your offer. Here is my response: 

Throughout Mr. Ham’s response to my article, he brings up a few points. One being: 

In another lie, Simko claims the museum teaches that “there are no fundamental physical laws of the universe, everything is subject to disruption and miracle.” This is simply not true—the Bible clearly says that there are laws of nature. Jeremiah 33:25 tells us that there are “ordinances of heaven and earth.” And, of course, God can interrupt these laws—He put them in place and He sustains the universe, and He’s free to suspend them if He chooses!

As a student of science, I simply cannot believe that. The fact that the Bible says that there are “ordinances of heaven and earth” may be a truth, but the fact that they are fundamental are not. As Mr. Ham quotes, I write that the Museum believes that “there are no fundamental physical laws of the universe, everything is subject to disruption and miracle.” Fundamental is a word that means the most basic level - forming a foundation. If these laws are subject to whimsical changes by a deity, they are not fundamental. Despite one’s personal views, the concept of religion should be irrelevant to science. A scientist should use God as neither an explanation or a result of a scientific finding - in this way, science will never be able to prove the existence or lack thereof of a God, for his existence should be irrelevant to science. I hope that this is clear. 

In describing the origin of skin color, Mr. Ham writes: 

…we teach that man is descended from a single couple, Adam and Eve, who had all the genetic material in them to produce all the different shades of skin we see today. We explain that there is one basic color for humans because of the pigment melanin. We believe (and it fits with our understanding of genetics) that they were a middle brown shade, and the Tower of Babel resulted in a sorting out of genetic material. This produced the many skin tones we see today, which are all really just varying shades of brown. 

Although his beliefs on the genetics of skin color are still mistaken (read below), here I must retract my statement that the museum advocated the Curse of Ham, as Mr. Ham has linked me to an article that showed otherwise (I have edited the original post to fix and declare the misquote). Nonetheless, Mr. Ham’s statement on genetics is still incorrect. Current understanding of genetics presents a basic three-pronged approach to the evolution of skin color: 

• Beginning a little over a million years ago, and lasting until less than 100,00 years ago, the ancestors of all people alive were dark-skinned African (not a middle brown shade). In the museum, Adam and Eve are presented as tan at best (despite living amongst dinosaurs, but Mr. Ham didn’t contest this point). 
• As varied populations began to migrate northward from Africa, the evolutionary necessity responsible for maintaining skin dark decreased proportionally to the distance north a population migrated, resulting in a range of skin tones within northern populations.
• At some point, northern populations experienced positive selection for lighter skin due to the increased production of vitamin D from sunlight and the genes for darker skin disappeared from these populations.

Later in the article, Mr. Ham writes: 

In his third untruth about our beliefs, Simko says we teach “that all logic is irrelevant, and to never trust ‘man’s word,’ only ‘God’s Word.’” We’re not ashamed to tell people that God’s Word is the ultimate authority in every area of life, and that man’s word is fallible and changes. However, we don’t teach that logic is irrelevant—logic comes from God! Logic is the correct way of thinking, and the laws of logic are God’s standard for reasoning. It would make no sense, logically speaking, for us to claim that logic is irrelevant. In fact, the Bible says: “Come now, and let us reason together” (Isaiah 1:18). Again, for the truth about what our ministry teaches, read the article “Logic or Faith?” on our website. By the way, if the universe was a result of random processes, why would we even have (or trust) the laws of logic?

While Isaiah 1:18 is a wonderful verse to quote, if Mr. Ham would’ve continued in the verse, he would find that Isaiah 2:22 tells readers to: “Stop trusting in man, who has but a breath in his nostrils. Of what account is he?”  To me, this quote seems to question the basic ability of human kind to understand and comprehend the complex universe that a God has created - and once again, as a student of science, this is not a doubt that I can accept. 

Further down, Mr. Ham writes that “the Creation Museum and Answers in Genesis have no problem with observational science like biology, chemistry, etc.” It is logically impossible to claim to “have no problem with observational science” while simultaneously claiming that the Earth is merely a few thousand years old. Additionally, later in the sentence Mr. Ham claims that evolution is “unproven” and “untestable.”

Among other things, Mr. Ham claims that “I can’t seem to do proper research,” all the while multiple links exist on his website that claim that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old and humans and dinosaurs once coexisted. Research, you say? He claims that I attempted to “lead others astray” from the “word of God,” when I clearly made no attacks to his religion - just his outrageous scientific beliefs. Additionally, I suggest to Mr. Ham that he direct more of a focus towards spreading Jesus’s fundamental messages of love, tolerance and “turning the other cheek,” as messages that I have received from many of his supporters have been anything but resptectful. 

While we clearly disagree on certain points, I hope that this post has cleared up a few of my prior arguments. In Mr. Ham’s article, he “encourages” me to visit. Mr. Ham, I’d love to come visit and do a more thorough analysis of the museum, as well as discussing this further with you if possible. Any aforementioned associates or Mr. Ham, or the man himself, please contact me at tylersimko@gmail.com and we can sort out the details of a possible visit. As always, I will keep the readers posted. 

-Tyler Simko