Ken Ham Offers Proof of God!

You’ve been searching for this all your life. So have we. So has everyone. Now, at last, you can have it!

This comes from Ken Ham (ol’ Hambo), the Australian entrepreneur who has become the ayatollah of Appalachia. As you know, ol’ Hambo is co-founder of Answers in Genesis (AIG), an on-line ministry which is one of the major sources of young-earth creationist wisdom. AIG also created and operates the infamous, mind-boggling Creation Museum — the North American Mecca for the mindless.

At Hambo’s personal blog we read: Proof of God. Well, darn! Let’s get right to it. Here are some excerpts, with bold font added by us:

I will be speaking at a conference in Florida in a couple of weeks organized by Creation Today.

How disappointing! Hambo doesn’t give us the proof in his blog. We’ll have to wait for the conference. But what’s “Creation Today”? Here’s their website. What do we learn there? The place is run by Eric Hovind — the son of that well-known creationist — Kent Hovind.

As you know, Kent is currently in the slammer serving time for tax evasion, and the last time we wrote about him was here: WorldNetDaily: Kent Hovind Is Still Fighting. Notwithstanding Kent’s disgrace, Eric is carrying on. His website informs us:

Born in Kankakee, Illinois, Creation Speaker Eric Hovind was blessed with the opportunity of growing up in a Christian home under the incredible biblical teachings of his father.

[...]

During summers throughout his junior high and high school years, Eric traveled with his dad where he was speaking about creation, evolution and dinosaurs. It was during his third summer of traveling with his father that Eric realized that he never grew tired of the subject! Hearing creation lectures and debates hundreds of times never became boring.

Eric was indeed blessed to be raised up in that fine tradition. But that’s not all — get this:

After completing his high school studies at Pensacola Christian Academy in 1997, Eric graduated from Jackson Hole Bible College in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Co-founded by Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis and Dr. Don Landis of Jackson Hole Community Bible Church, Jackson Hole Bible College was designed to give students a solid biblical foundation with a special creation emphasis.

Wow — Eric went to a bible college founded by Ken Ham! What a background! Let’s get back to Hambo’s blog:

So, join me on October 12–13 in Orlando, Florida, for the Proof of God Conference. I promise that the conference will radically change the way you share and defend your faith! Act now to get in at a special AiG rate of $49.95 per person (that’s $20 off regular pricing).

That sounds like a real bargain! And it’s only two weeks from now. Aren’t you excited?

That’s all Hambo has to say, except he gives us this link to the conference website: Proof of God Conference. That’s where it’s all going to happen. At that link you get a list of “six dynamic speakers for two powerful days,” and among them are Eric and Hambo. It’s going to be a great creationist revival meeting!

You don’t want to miss this one, dear reader. Get on over to Orlando and attend both days. Soak up that good old fashioned, down-home, foot-stompin’, psalm-singin’, floor-rollin’, rafter-shakin’, old-time creationism, and then come back here and tell us what you learned.

Copyright © 2012. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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82 Days Until the World Ends on 21 December

Most of you know that the world is scheduled to end on 21 December 2012. Wikipedia summarizes all of the information in this article: 2012 phenomenon. This Countdown Clock is a handy reference which you can consult to determine how much time remains.

You may think this is far from our usual concerns about The Controversy between evolution and creationism, but we disagree Those who believe in Noah’s Ark and those who believe that it’s all going to end on 21 December aren’t too far apart at all. They all believe in one myth or another telling them that for supernatural reasons, this is the Planet of Doom.

We kept a faithful countdown for Harold Camping’s end of the world prophesy, and now we begin our latest End of the World series with an article from the website of Der Spiegel, one of Europe’s largest publications. Their story is titled French Village Offers Refuge from Apocalypse. Here are some excerpts, with bold font added by us:

At the foot of the French Pyrenees, among twiggy bushes and dusty rocks, lies Bugarach. Just getting there alone is torture. … There are many reasons why the village, population 200, is a popular travel destination these days. Some come to go hiking, others to relax. And some come for a reason that lies completely beyond the earthly sphere.

They believe that Bugarach is special because, according to the calculations, the village is supposed to be saved from the hellfire — at least that’s the story in Internet forums on the topic, which have selected the spot as a modern-day Noah’s Ark.

That’s good to know. But it’s not just wild speculation. Get this:

The village has its local 1,230 meter-high mountain, Pic de Bugarach, to thank for the attention. In the mountain, according to the conspiracy theorists, are slumbering extra-terrestrials, who will come to life on December 21. For them, Bugarach is actually a garage for UFOs, because they believe alien spaceships are parked in caves in the mountain. The aliens will rescue the chosen few — that is, anyone in the town — from the apocalypse. To prove their theories, hikers film their supposed encounters with the extra-terrestrials and post them on the Internet.

It seems like that’s the place to be on 21 December. Let’s read on:

So will the pilgrims of the apocalypse descend on the town in droves? At least the town’s mayor, Jean-Pierre Delord, is afraid they will. For two years the Socialist politician has warned about the forces threatening his hometown: invasion by New Agers, sect meetings and collective suicide.

He’s probably right. We continue:

Because apocalypse types have bought up all the land in the area in the last years, real estate prices in the area have already risen substantially, he [the mayor] says. Recently, he witnessed a type of procession happening in the forest. “They were all dressed in white,” he says. “I hope that they don’t all take their lives together at some point.”

It’s gonna get worse. Here’s more:

The French agency, the Interministerial Mission for Monitoring and Combatting Cultic Deviances (Miviludes) is just as alarmed. [BWAHAHAHAHAHA! What a bureaucracy!] “Until now, more than anything else, the topic has been exploited for commercial reasons,” officials at the agency wrote in their 2010 annual report. The report was referring to postcards, magic wands and “eternity stones,” which can all be ordered especially for the apocalypse.

We gotta get one of those magic wands! Moving along:

Still, the report said that the risks cannot be underestimated, especially in light of the collective suicide of the Sun Temple sect in the 1990s, in which 74 people died. The authorities say that they currently do not have any new insights into what might happen in Bugarach. “But we’re observing the development very closely,” says Miviludes spokesperson Claire Barbereau.

It’s comforting to know that the bureaucrats are keeping an eye on things. One more excerpt:

Meanwhile, the phenomenon at play in the French village is nothing new. “As far as end-of-the-world scenarios are concerned, there’s a centuries-old supply closet full of recurring themes,” says Eberhard Bauer from the Freiburg Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology and Mental Health (IGPP). Bauer and his colleagues counsel, among others, people who are afraid of the end of the world. A “spiritual refuge, in which only the chosen few are able to escape,” such as Bugarach, is one of the common themes, he says. “It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that some people are taken advantage with these ideas of redemption.”

There’s much more to the article, and we get the impression that whoever wrote it thinks the whole thing is a joke. Skeptics can try to downplay things — unbelievers always do — but we’re taking it all very seriously. Let’s see if they’re still laughing on 21 December. We plan to keep you updated on all developments, so stay tuned to this blog.

Copyright © 2012. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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Weekend Free Fire Zone #28

This is shaping up to be another weekend with no news of The Controversy between evolution and creationism. And yet another week has passed without a decision in the Coppedge case — the trial ended on 16 April, so we’ve been waiting five and a half months.

Until we find some good stuff (i.e., creationist wackiness) to write about, here are some items that you may find interesting: How to see Uranus. This is an especially good time for Uranus gazers, because:

The planet Uranus reaches opposition on Saturday (Sept. 29). This means that Uranus is directly opposite the sun in the sky.

In addition to observation tips, the article also provides “Strange Uranus facts.” Included is a description of its axis of rotation, which means that for half its year, one hemisphere of Uranus is where the sun don’t shine, and then the situation gets reversed. You will also learn how that celestial orb got its name.

In other news, as you may have already heard, the writings of Alfred Russel Wallace are now online. That’s a link to the news report from the National Center for Science Education, and the actual website is here: Wallace Online.

That’s all we’ve got, so once again, we have to entertain ourselves. As with all our free-fire zones, we’re open for the discussion of pretty much anything — science, politics, economics, whatever — as long as it’s tasteful and interesting. Banter, babble, bicker, bluster, blubber, blather, blab, blurt, burble, boast — say what you will. But avoid flame-wars and beware of the profanity filters.

We now throw open the comments to you, dear reader. Have at it.

Copyright © 2012. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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Klinghoffer: Darwinism Is a Culture of Death

They have, at least for the moment, stopped blogging about their own books, which is a welcome change for the neo-Luddite, neo-theocrats at the Discovery Institute‘s creationist public relations and lobbying operation, the Center for Science and Culture (a/k/a the Discoveroids, a/k/a the cdesign proponentsists).

The Discoveroids’ latest post is Wesley Smith Launches New “Human Exceptionalism” Blog at NRO. It’s by David Klinghoffer, whose creationist oeuvre we last described here, and upon whom the Discoveroids have bestowed the exalted title of “senior fellow” — i.e., flaming, full-blown creationist. His name has some of the resonance of Red Skelton’s Clem Kadiddlehopper.

Klinghoffer says, with bold font added by us and his links omitted:

Wesley Smith is not only our Discovery Institute colleague — he’s also a hero. That’s two reasons why it is so delightful to be able to announce the launch of his new blog, Human Exceptionalism, at National Review Online.

We’re very sorry to learn that National Review has gone openly creationist. Perhaps they’ve been that way for a while but we weren’t aware of it. Well, we are now. Let’s find out what else Klinghoffer says:

No one has done more than Wesley to bring home the very practical consequences, in the most powerful moral terms, of the Darwinian-materialist picture of the world. His subject matter is not theoretical stuff but the gross crimes against our own humanity that result — and are doing so right now — when a culture increasingly turns to a conception of man that see us as nothing more than animals. That’s what Darwinian evolutionary theory is all about at the end of the day, isn’t it?

Darwinism causes crimes against humanity? What? Oh, we forgot for a moment that we’re writing about a Discoveroid essay. Let’s read on:

You can put your cat or dog down when it becomes too expensive or troublesome to keep caring for their illness, so why not human beings as well? This is the horrible perspective behind what is sometimes called by the euphemism “death with dignity.”

Are they now going to blame euthanasia on Darwin? It was practiced by the Greeks and the Romans in ancient days — if it weren’t a common practice, the Hippocratic Oath wouldn’t mention it. Anyway, Klinghoffer continues, telling us that Wesley is writing that euthanasia is being practiced in Holland, Belgium and Switzerland. Then he quotes Wesley:

Here’s the moral of the story: Once a society agrees that some suicides are good, the categories of the killable never stops expanding.

Here’s how Klinghoffer wraps it all up:

So we see the logic of Darwinism working itself out. The outcome is a culture of death.

There you are, dear reader. Today’s news is that National Review has gone creationist, and Klinghoffer has something new to blame on Darwin — euthanasia.

Copyright © 2012. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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