Creationism best explains Bone Cave

[hank moon]

The thing I least understand about the need some Christians have to continually prop up their strange pseudo-scientific

Yep. Starting to think "people of faith" do not exist. But then...I think that Creationism also best explains the Eiffel tower...

[hewhocaves]

The thing I least understand about the need some Christians have to continually prop up their strange pseudo-scientific arguments for a 6,000 year old earth...

well imagine if everything that you were told since you were a kid was absolutely wrong; that all the people you looked up to were suddenly looked at as ignorant buffons and the place you grew up in was some backwater little jackhole of nowheresville.

you might become a little defensive. and now with the internet, it's easy to find a thousand other people who feel EXACTLY the same way you do. And hey, if a THOUSAND people all feel the same way, well, then there has to be some validity to your point of view - right?

*sigh*. Someone should offer to explain it to the writer, but gently.. gently...

[Teresa]

Well, all I know is I got home from convention to find a piece of slick (yes, really slick 4 color, like a show cave brochure) piece of creationist karst literature sent to me by a fellow grotto member. It is titled Cave Formations, and explains, on the basis of Carlsbad and Mammoth Caves, how karst was instantaneously and catastrophically formed from sulfuric acid mixing with the floodwaters of Noah. The literature gives an 800 number and a weblink for more of this if one is interested. It came with some poorly xeroxed tracts and a return address, but no personal note.

In the 4 color brochure there is about 75% standard scientific explanations of things, mixed with 25% of Biblical explanation of the origins. This is quite sneaky and insidious.

Considering the percentage of caves and karst in the Bible Belt, we need to be aware of what these folks are doing, or we could easily become complicit in the de-secularization of America. There are plenty of geologists who follow a personal religion--we're not all godless atheists-- but mixing actual science with Biblical literalism isn't a good thing, IMO.

[JoeyS]

As a schooled erf scientist, though not practicing, I always found it frustrating that people would doubt the age of the Earth according to science because it might contradict what one reads in the Bible, yet most all things we do in modern medicine would not jive in Bible land either...
However, I just find it's easier to just not talk about it with them.
And, Teresa, regarding the brochures; at least they tout the historical significance(and thus need for preservation of) those speleothems... I mean they were created by the hand of Noah, by god!!

[FiddleCaver]

de-secularization of America

This really isn't the issue, if the "de-secularization" even exists. I understand I'm going just a bit off topic, but it seems to me that the only thing that has changed concerning religion in the recent history of the world is that we are entering another one of those times when the secularists become more secular and the religious become more religious. That is to say, the gap between these extreme philosophies is widening. If history repeats itself, the world will, in time, be friendly and it will no longer be cool to be extreme.

Now on with the subject at hand... This creationism geology, I wonder if any of these people have ever read any science history. I can't help but notice the similarity between this and several of the events that Galileo faced, most notably when Pope Urban VIII personally asked Galileo to give arguments for and against heliocentrism in the book entitled "Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems", and also asked him to be careful not to advocate heliocentrism.

So what's next, are we going to have to stand by while our children are taught Creationism Geology 101? Speaking from reality though, why in the world are we even discussing this? If history has taught us anything, it is that intelligence plays a huge role in natural selection and that good science will survive and bad science will eventually die. When it is once again not cool to have some extremist philosophy, everyone will stand back and say, "One drop at a time? I bet that huge stalagmite did take a long time to form."

[Squirrel Girl]

You know. To mix a couple threads.... From my "I can't get a date" hijack of Nico's Cavebabes and Mudchix thread.....

OK, so ya gotta know I am a major freak magnet. When I do go on dates, The weirdest ones find me. Back two years ago I was going on dates just to see how their freakhood would manifest itself.

Back to this guy I've gone on a few dates with recently. He's into the whole paranormal thing. Hook line and sinker. Sunday, after going hiking with him, we grabbed some dinner and I had to listen to him ramble on and on about how during the cold war aliens prevented our Titan missiles from launching so the Russians could catch up with us in order to maintain a balance of power.


Then he got into the whole 9/11 conspiracy. There was the whole argument of how the govt confiscated gas station surveillence tapes. Well guess what, bucko! *There are no gas stations anywhere near the Pentagon!* I live out here, I've driven past the Pentagon lots of times. There aren't any! If I had the interest in staying with the guy, I'd propose a field trip to find those gas stations, and ask the owners about the confiscated tapes. But, I'm ready to move on.

My point in all this, and I have other examples as well, is that you cannot persuade with logic, an idea that someone arrived at with emotion. I can give that guy other proof about 9/11, but he won't believe it, because he doesn't *want* to. He'd rather believe the whacko stuff. Same with the fundie religious people.

What weirds me out, is that this guy I've dated slips seamlessly between perfectly lucid and perceptive about something regarding politics and the like, then suddenly like an optical mouse, he zings way off rom where you think it is.

And I believe that's a basic propensity of human nature as I see it all the time. Relgious fundies are just one manifestation of it, and only the outside world that hasn't been sucked in can be persuaded by logic (and hence the reason for continuing to fight them--stopping new recruits).

This is why it's important to keep religion out of schools and most importantly, to teach critical thinking.

[hewhocaves]

...and most importantly, to teach critical thinking.

And I think that's the salient point. If they dont' have a grasp of critical thinking, then all you're doing is replacing one dogmatic ideology with another. It doesn't matter to them which one is right - because to them it is indistinguishable. And while the geology people migth feel smug and superior because they aren't idiots, they've still failed in their initial goal, which was to educate the ignorant.
Now its accepted that it becomes harder to convince someone of something radically new the older they get, which makes it imperative that you get to them when they are young. Which is why I get so annoyed when places like Hollywood screw up basic science - because one good action movie can counter a hundred boring sermons.

On the other hand, I was walking out of the Geology building for the 1000th time and talking to some random undergrad about her chat with her 101 professor. She apparantly did not do so well in her summer course. About ten seconds into the conversation she told me "Geology is sooo boring."
I'd been down this road before. "What", I asked her "was her major."
You could see her eyes light up when she thought of her major. "Accounting!" She said with a smile.

It boggles the mind.

[Teresa]

Religious fundies are just one manifestation of it, and only the outside world that hasn't been sucked in can be persuaded by logic (and hence the reason for continuing to fight them--stopping new recruits).

This is why it's important to keep religion out of schools and most importantly, to teach critical thinking.

I went to both a religious school and a public school in the Midwest. There was more religion, religious intolerance and proselytizing in the public school.
I can't say which taught more critical thinking skills. Probably the religious one, since we actually studied philosophers there-- not only the message but the method.

And while the geology people might feel smug and superior because they aren't idiots, they've still failed in their initial goal, which was to educate the ignorant.

Ah, but the people promoting creationist geology are the people who think *we* are the ignorant. And they are trying to educate us.

Now its accepted that it becomes harder to convince someone of something radically new the older they get, which makes it imperative that you get to them when they are young. Which is why I get so annoyed when places like Hollywood screw up basic science - because one good action movie can counter a hundred boring sermons.

And that was just my point: American fundamentalism has never been boring. Just think of snake-handlers, revivals, drive-in churches, river baptisms, televangelists. Which is why it attracts crowds. Hence the rise of creationist museums, this slick literature, creationist theme parks and coffeehouses-- even vacation Bible school is being repackaged as entertainment with a message.

Geology, in comparison, is boring to the average person... reading geology journals is the equivalent of plowing through the Bible in Greek or Latin. Many cavers put down some show caves because they are entertainment spectacles. While I'm as against putting out bad info as the next person, these operators have a point-- entertaining the masses makes money and gets the point across.

This was the first time I'd ever seen creationist literature specifically directed at speleology. The 'wonder of God's creation' has long been a staple of some show cave operations. I wonder how long it will be before there is an overtly fundamentalist show cave whose interpretive tour goes far beyond the reading of Genesis or Easter sunrise services?

[Jim 23482]

Here is a student who needs the world to open up to him, and swallow him whole. Religious beliefs are formed from the hope that a higher power can control all. That everything was created within the time frame of written human history.
The scientific facts that show the Earth has been around a lot longer disputs their beliefs and then is denied. The beliefs of the"fundi" are so intrenched into the psyci that any deflection of their "true path" is fought with all their strength.
Having faith and the belief in a higher power is never a bad thing. It helps give hope and appreciation to what is around you. It helps calm and strengthen the spirit to face the horrible events that happen day to day.
But to claim that there is the only way is not correct. Doesn't matter if it is Christian, Hebrew, Muslim, Hindu, Buddaism or any of the other religions in the world. They all count on one thing. That there is a higher power.
If the Creationist want to teach their way of looking, then they should do so with science in the studies as well.

And did I swing OT.

[thermopyle]

You know, this went on and on in the local paper after this kid got his essay published. Here are a few more locals chiming in, arguing through the op-ed pages of the paper:


Creationism best explains Bone Cave (Original Essay)

Scientific facts undermine 'righteous opinion' on Bone Cave (Rebuttal to the esay)

Letter writer defends theory that Bone Cave refutes evolution (rebuttal to the rebuttal)

Student errs in describing evolutionists as non-believers (more opinions from someone else

This has become a bone of contention (some columnist jumps in on the game)

Student too readily dismisses the science behind evolution (more...)

Evolutionist puts faith in 'evolving theory' rife with discrepancies (yet more...)

*Cue the Energizer Bunny*
and going and going and going

Bone cave to me is just another example of what once must have been a beautiful cave destroyed by giant machines and dynamite and drills. Shouldnt that be the real lesson of this six-foot deep hole and pile of rocks that used to be a cave?

[graveleye]

I might lose some friends here by coming clean, and I sure hope this doesn't happen, but I am in church almost every Sunday, and I am a Christian 100%. But I also have a keen sense of geology. The Bible doesn't say anywhere that I have found, that the world is 6000 years old. Biblical "scholars" came up with that figure by extrapolating generations written in the Bible. Yea, a lot of people believe that and it is unfortunate. A few years ago I was told by a tour guide in a cave that the fossils in the limestone were remnants of the Great Flood. I was aghast!
Now folks, God gave me a good brain and the will to use it. But knowing that the world is billions of years old, and that creatures including man have evolved and devolved has not affected my faith in the least. It strengthens it in fact, and I find it even more amazing. I know intuitively that the first few pages of Genesis are a metaphor, and this does not bother me either. If people want to stifle themselves by adhering to strict "creationism" then that's their business. There are also a lot of folks who make it a hobby to debunk the Bible and ridicule Christians, but also flip right to the horoscopes in the daily rag each and every day, and that's their business too.
I am sure there are probably going to be some people who will instantly lose respect (if any LOL!!) in me for admitting my faith, and that's too bad... but I have witnesses that have seen me drink beer and curse, and not proselytize like the stereotypes. Bottom line and the point I am trying to drive home is that not all Christians are prone to taking things so literally.
Oh and I HATE being called a fundi. I don't even KNOW any fundies.

(I am probably going to find myself caving alone now, but that's ok I guess)

[tncaveres]

I wish would have seen this earlier.
I am with graveleye on this one.
Come on down here graveleye & we can cave together.

[JoeyS]

Grav: You are not alone here

There is such a thing as keeping one's religion separate from the pursuit of science. It's just that alot of people promote the idea that all Christians are idiots and incapable of subject separation..
I do concede though, that some are idiots, but they are on both sides of the debate. Like the conspiracy kooks, for example.

And on that note, I thought that the discussion of religion and politics had been banned on Cavechat?
Guess it gets a pass if the general trend of the thread is painting Christians in a bad light... Hmmm...

[graveleye]

well, as a mod here, I probably shouldn't have even posted anything but this is something close to my heart. The poli-rel subjects are taboo, but it is very difficult to avoid especially if it is from a cave-related news story or op-ed, as is this case.
I don't have a problem with this thread as long as it doesn't turn into a flame war, and I hope that no one stokes it into something like that. If it turns ugly from any point of view, then I am sure it will be locked.

That being said, we're all civil here, aren't we? Let's keep the discussion light and realize that we're all actual people here and not words on a page. Beyond being people, we're also cavers, so let's get along and respect one another.

I appreciate the offer to go caving and I'll take you up on it.

Some might think this silly, but Shannon and I do a good bit pf praying before every cave trip and give thanks when we return... not just thanks for our safety, but thanks for getting to witness and experience something more magestic and awesome than can be imagined. We're all privileged as cavers.

[thermopyle]

If anyone is interested, here's more info on Cumberland Bone Cave:

PDF brochure

Wiki piece

There's also a geocache up there if you ever feel the desire visit. It is a neat place to see a cave 'inside-out," though there's no caving to be done there.

(Sorry about not jumping in on the religion discussion. Not something I enjoy doing. )