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It seems that certain people are hell-bent on censoring any kind of comment on these talk pages.
While I agree that the main pages should be kept clean and that damage caused by vandals should be repaired, these pages should not be censored and any opinions expressed here should not be oppressed in the way in which they are being. Otherwise, what is the point of having talk pages?
All I did was ask a simple question. Clearly, some people did not like the question and think of themselves as superior. Clearly they have an ego problem. Clearly, anyone who points out that they have an ego problem is automatically in the wrong because we don't want to admit to themselves how conceited they really are now do we!
No doubt that this comment will also be removed because it offends one of those conceited people. I truly pity them. They are small people.
I initially removed Intelligent Design as a "see more" link because Ken Ham and AiG generally do not support ID from my understanding of them (ID is not the same as Young Earth Creationism). But I'm not going to get into an edit war over it. -- Fastfission 00:27, 6 Jul 2004 (UTC)
FastFission, while I agree with you that ID is not the same thing as YEC, it is however related to the creation/evolution controversy, and thus probably should be included. But I agree, it's not worth an edit-war. :-
Removed 'see also' as it pertains to Answers in Genesis, not Ken Ham agapetos_angel 09:24, 8 August 2005 (UTC) Ditto for the 'creation museum' section; it was already present (and better written) on the AiG article, the more appropriate place agapetos_angel 01:23, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
In response to the recent edits on contradictions in the Bible.
1) If you spend as much time as I have looking through the Answers in Genesis website then you'll see that AiG has addressed at least some of the apparent contradictions in Genesis. Sorry I don't have the references at the moment- if you're really desperate I can look for them.
2) I'm not certain whether it's NPOV to claim that there exist 'contradictions' as opposed to 'apparent contradictions'. In a literary text such as the Bible- context is everything and it is usually possible to argue that black is white given context and interpretation. I'm not saying that's a good thing.
3) To be scrupulously fair- there are many apparently contradictory phenomena in science- that doesn't mean that they're wrong- it sometimes means that we just aren't smart enough to understand the situation. For instance quantum mechanics and general relativity are almost universally acknowledged to be contradictory in some situations. That doesn't necessarily invalidate the worth of either.
4) Biblical literalists don't always claim that they have all the answers and will sometimes openly admit that they aren't smart enough to explain a contradiction. I think credit is due to them for that. There's a big difference between that position and the one of actively ignoring the problem and misdirecting people.
I think we're almost there. It's appropriate to cite skeptical sources which point out (apparent or not) contradictions in Genesis. Be a little bit careful about accusing Ham or AiG of ignoring these contradictions (whatever you think of Ham, I'm sure he knows Genesis inside-out).
Thanks for your input Christianjb 15:44, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
1. Some contradictions are, as you say, addressed on the AiG website (go there and search for 'contradictions'). However, Ham insists upon literal interpretations when they suit his point of view, and disputes the text when it doesn't suit. Apart from the contradictions in the text, his approach to the reading of it is contradictory too.
2. The contradictions are quite straightforward, there's not much to be apparent about!
I'd like to add some reference material to his assertions about belief in evolution 'causing' the evils in society, specifically, to back up my claim that these 'evils' are more common in states where a belief in creationism is more common. See [1] and elsewhere.
Firstly I strongly disapprove of anon edits and the news today shows that Wikipedia feels the same way. This especially holds true for controversial pages.
Secondly, you can't win here (in my opinion). You're arguing against Ham's theology, which is his interpretation and subjective view- not yours. Yes it may be entirely inconsistent- but isn't every theology (at least to others)? Christianjb 04:09, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Finally, most of your information is (or should be) already available on the Alleged inconsistencies in the Bible and other more appropriate pages. Let's just link there. Christianjb 12:06, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
I made a number of edits today -- most of them superficial, style, etc., such as moving & resizing an image, clearing up the external links section, removing lonely subsections (to clarify reading of the table of contents), and so forth. I made a number of edits that seem to be reflecting the consensus of talk page commenters, but may not be entirely -- I had a little trouble following the discussion through some of the juxtaposed comments. I do not intend to start an edit war. So, concerning the more major edits:
A. I renamed the "Criticisms" section "Criticisms of Ham", so that it is more clear that that space is not for general criticisms of creationism, Young-Earth creationism, or Answers in Genesis.
B. I removed this block of text:
"The text of Genesis contains apparent contradictions (e.g. [2] and [3]) and critics claim that a literalist interpretation of the text cannot therefore be possible, as it requires some of the text's assertions to be discarded in favour of other ones. This is sometimes countered by the philosophy that in an inerrant text it must be the interpretations which are wrong, and it is usally possible to find interpretations which resolve the contradictions. In particular, Answers in Genesis has addressed this issue [4], but skeptics generally view such explanations as post-hoc rationalization."
"Critics of Ham also express concern that the Book of Genesis can be used to promote a 'pro-family' agenda. Genesis firstly contains the story of Cain who killed his own brother Abel in a fit of envy. In the story of the Ark, Noah fails to plead for the lives of any of his relatives and family members when told by God of the flood that is to envelop the earth. This is in marked contrast to Abraham who asks God to reconsider the punishment against the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah should ten good men be found. One of Noah's sons then discovers his father naked while drunk and calls for assistance from his brothers to bring some dignity to the old man, for this he is cursed by Noah. Later on we find Abraham taking a concubine in Hagar when his own wife cannot have children. When Sarah does conceive, Abraham sends Hagar and his young son Ismael into the desert and almost certain death (had God not saved them). In the story of Joseph, Dinah is raped but her father Jacob shows almost no concern. There are many more instances in Genesis that suggest the promotion of traditions against modern day 'family values'."
for the following reasons:
1. Block A discusses Genesis contradictions and issues of biblical inerrancy, but does not even mention Ham. This would be better on the Answers in Genesis page or on the articles about Genesis or Biblical Inerrancy. It is my understanding that other users agree that this section does not fit with a biographical article, hence, why I'm proceeding with the removal.
2. Block B mentions Ham only in passing -- "critics of Ham also express concern" while focusing on stories in Genesis. Not only would this be more approriate on another page, but it also cites no external references that contain this critique. This text would be better on the Answers in Genesis page, for example, Answers_in_Genesis#Criticism.
C. There were some duplicate statements made in the text on Ham's writings that were both out-of-place and already listed in the Criticisms section (for example, "None of Ham's scientific analyses have been accepted into mainstream peer-reviewed scientific journals and they lie completely outside of mainstream science", in the Writings section, was removed because "Ham's stance on scientific matters have not been subjected to peer-reviewed analysis in mainstream scientific journals" is the opening sentence in the Criticisms section.
There might be a tendency to post criticisms of Young-Earth creationism, biblical inerrancy, or Answers in Genesis on this page when they should be focused on the aforementioned pages. As a biographical page, criticisms should focus on statements specifically made by Ham (including citations), actions undertaken by Ham, etc., rather than focusing on criticisms of more "widespread" beliefs Ken Ham holds ("widespread" in the sense that he is not the sole person holding those beliefs, and that those beliefs, therefore, have a separate page listing allegations about their own merits).
This edit was in good faith -- please revert/revise if I've acted too rashly. AnDrew McKenzie 17:05, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Is Ken Ham the President of just the USA AIG. I know he is its founder but if he is not incharge of the Australia AIG and British AIG then who is? Falphin 01:53, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
It seems to me that the part where it is stated that Mr. Ham's arguments are hotly debated in the skeptic community is not only inaccurate, but a flatout lie. His arguments are the standard young earth creationist arguments (be they more carefully stated than the arguments by fellow YEC Kent Hovind) and do NOT form a hot topic.
Secondly it seems to me that the addition of the word atheist (nearly as a form of slander) is of very limited value and gives the entire criticism section an inflammatory and slanted feel.
-- Jerom 16:21, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
This sentence is baffling: "Ham believes that evolutionary theory has contributed to the rise of humanism, racism, eugenics, euthanasia, pornography, homosexuality, family breakup, abortion, and more".
What's wrong with humanism? Was it supposed to be the bad "secular humanism"? Or was it to say "evolution sparks good and bad things"?
Oh, that is right. Creationists, along with most conservative Christians see relative morality (in particular humanist style morality) as dangerous. They hold that only absolute, Christian morality has any place, and should be above all human or relative concerns.
Pal sch 13:34, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
Ban all of these stupid people. 24.144.51.28 ( talk) 16:22, 15 February 2013 (UTC)
I just added the section about Ken Ham's daily radio broadcast. This is my first wiki contribution and I am open to criticisms of how I could have done this better. Dennis Fuller 15:29, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
This is an encyclopedia entry not a blog for personal views. Encyclopedia entries don't make judgments on the appropriateness of someone's salary or discourage it's readers from making donations.
Beside the blatant POV pushing, this section is poorly sourced. The NPTimes is a survey of 209 non-profits who voluntarily responded to the survey. CharityNavigator has a study from 4,000 charities that are required to make their financial information publicly available. If you look at CharityNavigator's CEO compensation study, you will see that Ken Ham's pay falls right in line with the averages compared to other charities with similar revenue.
Also, the salaries that were posted for other staff members are not sourced. Even if they can be sourced, there is nothing extraordinary about what they are being paid.
See this webpage. DennisF 15:59, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
I've added Their Own Version of a Big Bang - Los Angeles Times directly under the ext. links heading as it's pretty neutral and didn't fit any of the subheadings. ... dave souza, talk 10:43, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
To do list: MoS the 'Writings' section to 'Bibliography' (with ISBN) and 'External links'. agapetos_angel 02:43, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
I added some of what Ham teaches to children (from the LA Times article) in the Teachings category. I was not logged in when I did it. Oops. Mr Christopher 22:39, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
The recent edit in the section criticizing Ham for teaching children to distrust evolutionists needs to be reworked. I think it is a valid criticism but needs to be written correctly. As it stands, this section is a violation of No Original Research. As editors, we should not be gathering information to criticize Ham and make an analysis that reflects our POV, we should find other reliable sources that make the charge and report their analysis. DennisF 14:28, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
The edit I made quotes Ham so the evidence that he has children choose between God or science is obvious. Have you read his web site or his literature? And quoting him and what he teaches is not criticizing. You might try studying the guy this is not the first time he has made statements like that. And the scientific community overwhelmingly recognizes evolution as the best explanation for biology.
Sure there are other like Ham who reject scientific answers there are also people who believe the world is flat or that magnets can cure cancer. That does not make either notion true. The fact remains the bible is not a science book, dinosaurs predated mankind, and the world's age is measured in billions of years and not thousands. Pointing out Ham feels differently is not criticizing him nor does it reflect a POV, the evidence supports it.
If you have evidence that Ham teaches children legitimate scientific principles or that he encourages children to trust the scientific method then bring that evidence to this article. Mr Christopher 15:48, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Also, what if we put some stuff in like "Like other young earth creationists, Ham distrusts the scientific method and therefore believes in the literal interpretation of the Book of Genisis. In some of his speeches he encourages children to share his distrust for science and science teachers" and then quote him? Would that seem more accurate? Mr Christopher 15:53, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
I am not emotionally attached to anything I have written, so if it can be improved feel free to work with it. I hear some of your disagreement(s) with some of my comments and I have some ideas on how to rework some of it but I am short on time right now so if you have some ideas on improving it, by all means hop in there. I think what Ham teaches and who he teaches it to is very relevant yet I recognize I might not be articulating that very well. And from what his literature and published quotes of him suggest he is above all promoting the bible as the final authority on all matters, and in this case science. That is neither good nor bad, it is simply relevant I think. Mr Christopher 03:55, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
Are honorary degrees considered education? Is there a reference to a standard within Wikipedia? Ted 13:16, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
I question if Ham was ever a faculty member at Liberty. Are there any sources for this? DennisF 18:11, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Honorary degrees should not be included under "Education." They are not education in any real sense of the word. I have put them back in "Honors." I wouldn't feel bad about deleting them entirely, since most of the entries of people I have looked at who I know have honorary degrees don't have them listed. Ted 05:31, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
"Ham (and other creationists) believe...". We should not write this unless all other creationists also believe this, which I hope it is obvious that they do not. Can I remove it? DJ Clayworth 20:23, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
I really don't think that the criticisms of Ken Ham are valid. His question "were you there?" is quite literate. We can see changes in the fossil record, but we can't witness them happening now. And that wouldn't debunk creationism, because, in Ken Ham's own words, "I know someone who was there." Do evolutionists know anyone who "was there"? Ratso 14:54, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
Since there were no objections, I've added a tentative countercriticism paragraph. Please note, since I do agree with Ham/AIG on those issues, it's possible I haven't worded it neutrally enough; please check that, anyone, though I tried to fit NPOV as best I could. Also, anyone have a citation for the Hugh Ross vs. Ken Ham public debate? The only Ross debate with actual AIG staff I'm aware of was with Dr. Lisle, not Ham, at least as far as I can find. It's possible whoever wrote that was confusing Lisle for Ham. Also, if there are any countercriticisms to the countercriticisms, those should be included, as I understand it, so general callout if anyone knows of any (as said above, I've never found any myself). -- Bonesiii 06:07, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
Why is No Answers in Genesis listed here? They are far less respected the AiG. I tried to remove it, but someone reverted the change.--
Djdpmd 19:38, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
Hey! Ken ham goes to my church! PopiethePopester 14:29, 5 April 2006 (UTC) PopiethePopester
What does the quote "very, very submissive, supportive wife" add to this article? The article is not about Ham's wife, nor about his opinions of family life. It is about Ham, and his role as an advocate of Creationism. I have not seen anything like this on other biographical articles, and there are dozens of equally (ir)relevant quotes you could add to the article - such as the one I added. I see the selctions of this particular snippet for inclusion, and the exclsuion of other quotes about his wife from the same source, as a subtle attempt to poison the well. WaysAndMeans 18:53, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
If Ham talks about his private life in public then that's fair game for Wikipedia to discuss it. — Dunc| ☺ 10:50, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
What does the quote "very, very submissive, supportive wife" add to this article? Good question. Including this quotation gives the reader a bit of insight into
Ken Ham's worldview. The reader can then make her own inferences regarding
what kind of person Ken Ham is. The reader can then decide whether or not the man — or his ideas — are worthy of respect or admiration. This is one of the primary functions of any biography.
If this was some sort of miss quote, slip of the tongue or a comment made during some sort of journalistic windup during an interview then I would agree that it should go. But it wasn't, I bet if you were to ask him in a very relaxed setting whether his wife was 'very, very submissive' and whether this was something virtuous then he would say yes. He would be quite proud of this comment and the context that it was used. I think that's a valuable incite into his family life and his views on women. I suspect if this quote was in reference to Joseph Smith or even Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (President of Iran) you wouldn't mind.
Smooshable2 (
talk) 22:51, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
The problem I have with this quote "very, very submissive" is the implied contact. Ken was asked to talk about his wife and family. His response is over 400 words describing his appreciation for his wife and family supporting him and supporting the fact that he is often on the road. The entire sentiment of the reponse is one of appreciation for support. Boiling it down to "very, very submissive" is misrespresenting and misleading the audience. I expected to go to the article and read more about how Ken felt the wife should be a submissive partner, because that is how the quote reads, but that the type of response he gave. I believe a more approriate discreption is in his summary statement "a very special wife who wants to always support me and support the children". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wildcatgrad ( talk • contribs) 21:04, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
Way too many people are angrily berating Christians and Creationists because they disagree. Please, everyone be civil. If you can't handle an opposing argument, start your own blog and blast creationists all day. Keep it to the facts here, not heresay.
A reminder to all parties, this talk page is not for arguing about Ham or AIG. It is about discussing ways to improve the article. Also note that Ham is still alive, so WP:BLP applies to this talk page. JoshuaZ 06:28, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
I have an issue with the sentence in the Beliefs' section: Ham does accept that natural selection can give rise to a number of species from an original population, provided that all of these species are of the same kind (a term borrowed from Genesis 1:11 and elsewhere). '...A term borrowed from Genesis...' needs to mention a translation, as obviously, not all translations use the word 'kind'. And what does 'elsewhere' mean? Ashmoo 03:18, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
"Regarding his beliefs, Ham has told audiences, "If you disagree with what I'm going to say, please do not give me your opinion, because I'm not interested."[21]"
This is incredibly misleading. I'm no fan of the guy, but I checked out the link assigned to footnote 21, and he's speaking specifically to people who want to justify racism on the grounds that black and white people are a different race. It was to those people that he said don't tell me your views, I'm not interested. It's not true that he said here that he was uninterested in diverse beliefs in general, as this passage tries to imply. —Preceding unsigned comment added by BurkeDevlin ( talk • contribs) 21:48, 18 March 2009 (UTC)
Wasn't it a picture of a ham instead of a hat? I don't think a hat can be a fossil since it is nonliving. If I'm wrong please correct me.
I could have sworn that it was a ham. It's been over a year since I've seen the videos though. Maybe I'm just getting old.-- Jim Shorts 15:18, 17 March 2007 (UTC)Jim Shorts
I'm not sure why AiG's cricitism of Kent Hovind is present under the "criticism section," given that Hovind himself did not criticise Ken Ham or AiG. Find a secondary source which states that "certain critics do not endorse AiG's criticism of other YEC orgs" or something if you want it to be in the article.
Yoda921 05:38, 14 April 2007 (UTC)Yoda
I am removing the section on Talk.Origins. This is a biography on Ham, not what others think about him.--
Djdpmd 01:11, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
I am manually undoing the edits by Abiller68 regarding the AIG-CMI dispute. They are uncited, inaccurate and POV. The CMI lawsuit was filed on 31 May 07 (according to the copy of the actual claim filed), and the Creation Museum ribbon cutting ceremony was on 26 May 07 (according to AIG and Wikipedia’s own article on the Creation Museum). Something that occurred AFTER an event cannot possibly have occurred on the eve of that event. The addition of the “on the eve…” comment is almost a direct quote from AIG and is highly emotive, which makes me wonder just who Abiller68 actually is. There has been no documentation provided or referenced to indicate that AIG initiated binding arbitration of any kind at any time, or that CMI refused such. There is documentation available (already referenced in the article) which indicates that the opposite is true (i.e. the actual roles are reversed), although this documentation is provided by CMI themselves. Ultimately, we now have a situation where both parties have claimed that the other party has refused arbitration. Until something is published that firmly establishes one party’s refusal to enter binding arbitration, reporting this whichever way around amounts to POV. As a Christian and Young Earth Creationist I find this whole dispute tragic and frankly nauseating. However, since it is going to be included in Wikipedia articles it should be dealt with in the proper NPOV manner. I do notice that Abiller68’s only contributions were this same edit in the AIG and Ken Ham articles, and there is no user page. Again, I wonder who Abiller68 actually is. LowKey ( talk) 05:19, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
I have undone a couple of edits at the beginning of the criticism section. The edits inserted POV by asserting that creationism (and/or ID) is not accepted by "any" or "any major" scientific organisations. This gets into the problems of defining scientific. Many anti-creationists assert that any individual or group cannot by definition be both scientific and creationist. Then there will be the edit wars about creationists not being scientists because they do not publish in peer reviewed journals, as long as we disqualify any journal that publishes creationist research on the grounds that it if it does, then it is not scientific. The discussions (and indeed the individual arguments) become circular. Also, define major – if you dare, more edit war fodder. The entry was fine as it was. It made the point that creationism is scientifically unpopular. It allows readers to insert their own assumptions AFTER the text (which is where they should be). LowKey ( talk) 23:10, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
Anyone have a cite for this comment about the ICR? I don't know a lot about creationism, but this article from Contra Mundum at http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/CMBergman.html just slaps it into a "Other Creationist Groups" heading. Random name 15:33, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
Image:Ken Ham head shot.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.
Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.
If there is other other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. BetacommandBot 22:20, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
Wait, do you mean that people want more pics of Ken Ham but can't get any? I went to the Creation Museum last Summer and have two pics, if anyone wants to post them or something. Dinotitan ( talk) 18:42, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
Is Ham still an Australian citizen? Or has he gained U.S. citizenship during the two decades that he has lived in the states? Or is he just a permanent U.S. resident? Not that it makes much different, but if he has gained American citizenship it'd be worth including in the biographical portion of the article. Does anyone know? Jacob1207 05:11, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I should have done some more research first. A quick search turned up on this Ham quote: "I continue to be an Australian citizen, and I still hold an Australian passport though I am a legal resident of the United States." [6] That's from a March 17, 1999 letter. Worth putting in the article? Jacob1207 05:26, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Hmm the article now says he's just annouced he has obtained US citizenship, but I can't find this anywhere. Ref anyone? Random name 19:51, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
I added a brief description of the Creation Museum, since Ken Ham was prominently featured in virtually all the publicity surrounding its opening, and I linked to the main Creation Museum entry. I tried to be as NPOV as possible, and I would defend my phrasing that an essential feature of the Creation Museum is that it uses the "vocabulary, if not the methodology, of science". Happy to entertain suggestions for improvement, however. Talkingtomypocket 20:45, 1 July 2007 (UTC)
A link to a prank interview with Ken Ham was recently added to the entry. I am going to remove it, as I believe it has no place in an encyclopedia. Also, it is not "Offical and Pro Ham", the title of the section. Self-congratulatory stunts have plenty of other places to be featured. This is not a blog or a place for links that a particular crowd finds amusing. Talkingtomypocket 20:03, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
Are there any particular cites you feel are being used which don't actually match up to the areas they're in? The article has certainly gotten cite-heavy, as it seems like every time I visit this page, someone has placed requests for cites on yet another area of the page, often in areas where a cite hardly seems worth the trouble. (The number of children he has seems like an obvious example.) Random name 20:43, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the Ken Ham article from Category:Christian ministers since the assertion appears unsupported. Per AiG, "Ken Ham is not 'Rev.' Ham. He is not a pastor, does not lead a church, and has never been ordained." [7] That Answers in Genesis identifies itself as an "apologetics ministry" does not make it's head a minister. As the term is used in contemporary Christianity, a food bank would usually be considered a ministry, but the person handing out for food wouldn't therefore be a minister in the sense one usually uses the word. Jacob1207 ( talk) 22:56, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
Is this important? It seems to me that it was put in the article to make ken ham seem corrupt. I don't see how his income is really relevant to the article in any other way. -- BenSven Talk 22:08, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
As explained on the edit page, I think citing a person's salary really ought to be justified. It is not sufficient to cite a source that confirms the accuracy of the information. The source ought to demonstrate that the information is relevant, and the formerly-cited Charity Navigator source fails to do so. I conducted a cursory scan of dozens of other biographical wikis and I found zero articles that cite a person's salary, aside from Ken Ham's. Considering the controversial character of this article it would be prudent to avoid appearance of bias.
I propose that we follow the typical biography pattern, unless someone cites a reliable source that demonstrates the relevance of this additional information. DummySean ( talk) 16:05, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
We should give the salary. There are two reasons why your arguments are wrong: (1) It is not appropriate to expect an independent source that demonstrates that the figure is relevant. The source can be used to justify the figure, but not necessarily its relevance. It is up to the editors of wikipedia to consider its relevance. (2) Unusual, interesting or controversial salaries and earnings are often given in wikipedia. Steve Jobs' salary is $1. Sol Trujillo's salary was $13 million. Members of the Canadian House of Commons received $155,400 in 2008. Interpret those figures how you will. In my opinion, Ken Ham's salary is relevant information to readers---in my view, it is interesting because it is unusually high for someone with a teacher's training; others may find it interesting for different reasons. DJP ( talk) —Preceding undated comment added 23:31, 9 June 2009 (UTC).
I added a POV tag to the criticism section. I especially have a problem with the statement "His arguments have not gained acceptance with any major scientific organization." Unless a source is provided this statement should be removed. It seems this section has just become an area to talk about how much you don't like Ken Ham. It should be balanced out and reworded to meet Wikipedia's neutrality standards. Kristamaranatha ( talk) 02:17, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
I have just reverted an edit attributing to AIG (and by extension Ken Ham) the endorsement of a "literal" belief in God's Word. As Ken Ham, AiG, CMI and other YEC orgs and individuals have stated repeatedly, they subscribe to a "straightforward" or "plain" interpretation, which is very different to "literal". "Straightforward" means that one treats texts according to their literary features. Imagery is treated as imagery, poetry is treated as poetry, and histrocial narrative is treated as historical narrative. This means that there are texts which are to be read literally, and texts which are not. Open a magazine and start reading any random page, and you very quickly determine whether you are reading poetry, fictional narrative, historical narrative etc. You read the page in a straightforward manner but you may or may not read it literally. LowKey ( talk) 00:02, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Look, you seem not to have read your own position on this talk, which I responded to. Above YOU wrote: "they subscribe to a 'straightforward' or 'plain' interpretation, which is very different to 'literal'." I replied that this is mere semantics that should not be in the article.
My comments referred to your claims, NOT your edit. So your misguided and ill-informed attack doesn't fit here.
Obviously, this passage was meant to be taken as speaking of a total of seven literal days based on the Creation Week of six literal days of work and one literal day of rest. Ken Ham, December 20, 2007
and
There’s an inconsistency here in taking Genesis literally to accept sin to explain moral evil, such as the shootings at Virginia Tech, but not taking Genesis literally in their acceptance of millions of years of “natural evil” before man (e.g., death, violence, catastrophe, and extinction of animals). Ken Ham, President, AiG-US April 16, 2007
and the following is the very definition of Biblical literalism:
We need to realize that the Bible is God's Word. And as it is the inspired Word of the infinite Creator, God, then it must be self-authenticating and self-attesting. Thus, we should always start with what God's Word says regardless of outside ideas. Only God's Word is infallible. Ken Ham, December 1995
If you want more quotes from Ken Ham about literal Genesis, I suggest you try google. If you want to play semantics, I also suggest a forum. We66er ( talk) 21:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
The Daily Show statement makes WP look cheap. "Poking Fun" is not a criticism. Parody May be used as criticism, but it by no means safe to assume that it always is. What this needs is a RS ABOUT the Daily Show spoof stating what criticism it was making. Either a 3rd party review or a Daily Show summary of some sort would do the trick. LowKey ( talk) 05:20, 8 September 2008 (UTC)
I am thinking of working up a general description of the CMI-AiG dispute that covers the basics without getting into to much detail. I aim to replace the sections in the articles for CMI, AiG, CW and KH with this same general description, an emphasising the link to the Dispute article. The dispute article would then have all the relevant information in one place making it easier for editors to update, and to avoid inconsistencies. The sections get quite out of date the way they are, probably because it is a pain to go around updating the same info in at least 4 articles.
I would thus be moving some statements into the dispute article that are not currently included. I don't plan to drop any statements, so initially the dispute article will be a union of all the current sections. Any objections? This same "notice" is going into the other articles as well LowKey ( talk) 01:57, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
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Since Ham is an Old Testament biblical name, from where does Ken Ham's surname originate? Is it his birth name? -- 83.253.250.70 ( talk) 11:27, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
This might be worth mentioning as Ken Ham's ministry took pictures of license plates/bumpers to and he posted them online. C56C ( talk) 18:21, 16 August 2009 (UTC)
Is "Myers posted an account of the tour on his blog, and condemned the venue for "promoting the Hamite theory of racial origins, that ugly idea that all races stemmed from the children of Noah, and that black people in particular were the cursed offspring of Ham." [1] This led to post exchanges between Myers and Ham, who retorted, "Not only do we not teach such an absurd idea (that sadly has been used by some to promote racism and prejudice against dark skinned people), we teach against it." [2] [3]" necessary? This seems like a minor blog fight that doesn't serve much purpose havign all these details in. PZ's trip was covered in independent reliable sources but after that this is all just various blogs back and forth. JoshuaZ ( talk) 22:37, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
Given Ham's long track record of promoting Creation science (including founding or working for a number of organisations with 'Creation Science' or 'Creation Research' in their titles), it strikes me as incongruous that no mention of CS is made in the lead. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 03:14, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
I don't see how this is relevant to Ham particularly so I've removed it. There is an article on Creation Museum and I see this is already there. I see no reason why it should be here as well. Auntie E. ( talk) 05:10, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
The section on the Creation Museum should ideally be a distilled version of the article on it. To have a whole paragraph in the section devoted to this visit is undue weight. Auntie E. ( talk) 05:13, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
I have double-tagged the claim that "one of the oldest[10] American Creationist organisations" as:
Therefore, unless somebody can come up with a quote showing the source said this, or an alternative source, I intend downloading this claim fairly quickly. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 03:01, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
I came this article after a Google search. There were several childish edits I replaced with copied original sentences from the reference material. Duensing11 ( talk) 04:09, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
The Further Reading section is out of control. There should of course be external links to KH's own website, a biography (if it existed), etc. but the current KH-minded, YEC-friendly "reading list" seems completely out of line with WP standards. George Washington, Billy Graham, or Robert Oppenheimer have nothing like this.
I'd remove it at once but I don't want to be seen as a vandal by making such a sweeping edit so I'll wait a small period for discussion/consensus. -- Petzl ( talk) 01:31, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
None of these books appear to proffer any information on the topic of Ken Ham, so none of them are appropriate 'Further reading'. They appear to be works by Ham, so the more prominent of them may be appropriate for a 'Works' section. In the meantime, I'm moving the list here to talk. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 02:44, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
[End of removed material. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 02:44, 16 December 2010 (UTC) ]
Sorry, but I screwed up the last sentence in an attempt to fix it. Please, somebody who knows how to get rid of box, help. Desoto10 ( talk) 00:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
Removed " Dear Emma B a response to Ken Ham at Pharyngula" from the External Links section, as it is a blog post of a personal view on a comment of Ken Ham.
If we add such polemical links there, we should balance that we the inclusion of arguments of the other side (at least a post such as Are “Science” Blogs Really Science Blogs? pertaining to the topic).
Aoszkar ( talk) 12:39, 27 September 2011 (UTC)
Not sure I see the point to including the above paragraph in the Biography section of Ken Ham's article: it shows Ham's salary increase and the fact that he has several family members on the AiG payroll. Yes, we can infer much from this data. Nevertheless, I don't see how this data and the inferences are wikipedia-worthy.-- Petzl ( talk) 02:54, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
Most of what I've found on the Internet seems to have been copied verbatim from Wikipedia and the statement here is copied whole-cloth from this page at Answers In Genesis. Which is indeed used as reference in outdated mirrors of this page elsewhere. As such some sleuthing in the revision history shows this to be the point at which the pertinent reference and the framing statement were removed. I see no problem in reinstating these again albeit having rewritten them. Do note however that doing a site search via Google on the pertinent universities' sites brings up no relevant results. As far as the extent of my capabilities go, there is no relatively straightforward independent verification. It may just be the case that the pertinent records haven't been released online. Dracontes ( talk) 21:54, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
Noticed a really good addition to the lede today while viewing my watchlist. I went and read the citation left to prove this edit. "an evolution denialist viewpoint that is unsupported by scientific evidence." I see now that it is being contended. I think it is totally supported and wanted to stop lurking and give my two cents. Sgerbic ( talk) 00:03, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
Maunus: I find your argument to be utterly tendentious and without merit. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 04:18, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
Creationism is clearly against the scientific consensus, and the linked YEC article should say so, but I don't think each and every biographical article on a creationist needs a lengthy pro-evolution disclaimer in the lede. I've noticed a disturbing trend where defending the consensus view becomes so important in biographical articles that providing accurate information about the actual person takes second place. -- 202.124.72.243 ( talk) 13:26, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview. It should define the topic, establish context, explain why the topic is interesting or notable, and summarize the most important points—including any prominent controversies.
— WP:LEDE (my emphasis)
Alright, let's discuss it. I don't think the sentence "In 2005, The Daily Show poked fun at Ham's question." should be included in the Beliefs section of this article because Ham's comments have been made fun many times, and this is just one of them. In this case, nothing of importance is being added to the conversation. The video clip just shows a clip of Ham in the Moment of Zen section of The Daily Show, a segment where a bizarre/funny/ridiculous video is played without any commentary whatsoever. So where is the relevance of including this bit of information here? Trinitresque ( talk) 04:31, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
Per WP:SPS we can believe Ken when he says he does a radio show—but the 600 radio stations is an extraordinary claim beyond the normal so it is an undue weight problem. I believe him, but the source is insufficient for the claim. Could editors please find a source not connected with Ken's work that notes this (a Christian organisation outside of Ken's own organisations would be sufficient). Fifelfoo ( talk) 03:17, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
Almost half of the references here are to his own websites? Article desperately needs some reliable third party references. Theroadislong ( talk) 16:48, 4 September 2012 (UTC)
I have removed the recently-added "pseudoscience" paragraph that another editor has objected to. Skepdic.com is not an appropriate source for a BLP. While it may be better to find a better source for the claim, any such criticism should be specific to Ham himself. This sort of thing has been discussed before, (e.g. Talk:Ken Ham/Archive 1#Evolution Denialist) and controversial additions that have been challenged should not be re-added until a consensus can be reached. St Anselm ( talk) 06:07, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
I propose auto archiving for this talk page, using MiszaBot for threads over 180 days with 7 threads remaining. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 22:14, 2 November 2013 (UTC)
I'm going to use ClueBot III as MiszaBot is out of order. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 00:59, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
I think the phrase "implying that knowledge of unwitnessed events requires direct observation rather than inference" is misleading about his intent. Based on my (non-NPOV caveat) understanding of ideas, he means more along the lines of "the lack of direct observation of events leaves doubt." In other words, he believes that our present scientific knowledge cannot fully account for unobserved events. I do not have a third-party source to back that up. (two cents) 76.125.24.47 ( talk) 15:55, 6 February 2014 (UTC)
Discussion occurring below on proposed edits to the article. Please direct your attention there instead.
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The sentence, "His claims of the age of the earth that are counter to all scientific reports have been widely criticized and debunked." has been repeatedly removed from the lead without discussion here. First once an edit is reverted it is appropriate per WP:BRD to bring the subject to the talk page. Second the sentence is supported by four sources. Third it is a summary of substantial content in the body of the article. Fourth it reflects a significant aspect of the subject. Please present policy based rationale if you wish to remove or edit it. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 13:23, 18 March 2014 (UTC) Everything on there that is a fact I don't dispute and is in the criticism section of this article already. This is a living person article and criticism like that does not belong in the first lead paragraph. Also it is an opinion not a fact. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.178.43.177 ( talk) 13:28, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
That is from one point of view. The whole sentence seems to bring it to a conclusion. I don't dispute that he has widespread criticism even from christians. He does. If it has been debunked when why would Bill Nye bother debating him? How about a compromise edit? Thank you for your willingness to discuss. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.178.43.177 ( talk) 13:43, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
The sentence was removed again here. It is clearly a summary of material supported in the content of the article as mentioned in the edit summary when it was added here. Rationale for support has been given in this discussion. Additional rationale is in WP:LEAD, "summary of its most important aspects", "The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview. It should define the topic, establish context,...summarize the most important points", "emphasis given to material in the lead should roughly reflect its importance to the topic". Consensus is demonstrated by this, this, this and this as well as the above discussion. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 19:28, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
WP:ASF is clear that we should simply state that his claims are incorrect. We don't need to go into more detail about opinions. His statements about the age of the Earth are simply incorrect. That's all there is to say. jps ( talk) 20:37, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
There may be a more artful way to do it. "His beliefs about the Age of the Earth were shown to be incorrect more than one hundred years ago." would be one way of doing it. There are others. Basically we should not attribute the fact of the age of the Earth to the opinions of scientists. It is simply the age it is -- approx. 4.5 billion years old (give or take a few hundred million years). jps ( talk) 21:03, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
If I argue that the universe has always existed, is that the same or different than arguing that the universe is only a few thousand years old? My point is that you can say that scientists don't believe that the universe never had a beginning (or will have an end), but that's all you can say. In my lifetime, the universe has gotten about 3 billion years older. Have we now arrived at Truth, or will the universe continue to age as needed?-- John Foxe ( talk) 21:38, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps wording the sentence "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" as "His claims about the young age of the earth have been dismissed by the mainstream scientific community" would suffice for the mainstream point of view as well as all points of view. Unless Wikipedia prefers the mainstream point of view as opposed to the neutral point of view, I think this wording is an acceptable choice. — The Sackinator ( talk) 22:13, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Sorry, folks. If you cannot understand that the Age of the Earth is a fact and not an opinion, then you should not be editing Wikipedia. See WP:COMPETENCE. It's very basic. jps ( talk) 22:17, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
None of the links you provided show that there is any question about the age of the Earth. The neutral point of view is expounded upon
here. We simply state the fact that the age of the Earth is not what Ken Hamm says it is and leave it at that. It is simply a fact that he is incorrect.
jps (
talk) 6:36 pm, Today (UTC−4)
"His claims about the young age of the Earth are incorrect." works because it is in accord with
WP:ASSERT. Your proposed wording is not.
jps (
talk) 22:38, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Agree with jps. Fringe does not negate fact. Adequate discussion of policy above. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 22:54, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
———————— Lampstand49-These are my comments for consideration toward consensus. Please quit censoring (hiding) my comments. Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:26, 19 March 2014 (UTC) These four sources for the opening statement are arbitrary and require review. With the exception of Brett Grainger's book, these sources simply state opinions and not poll numbers. Here are the suspect sources that are simply one-sided. When the discussion becomes one-sided, it is merely propaganda. As it stands right now, the statement "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" is simply one-sided propaganda with no balance. I think we need to reveal where the ultimate authority for that statement resides. Here are the sources used to hand down a one-sided verdict using the old idiom as Judge, jury and executioner. : 4. ^ a b Greg Neyman. Ham Can't Tell the Simple Truth!. Answers in Creation. 12 Sept. 2005 5. ^ Wilensky-Lanford, Brook (2011). Paradise Lust: Searching for the Garden of Eden. Grove Press. pp. 215–. ISBN 9780802119803. Retrieved 18 March 2014. 6. ^ Flank, Lenny (2007-01-01). Deception by Design: The Intelligent Design Movement in America. Red and Black Publishers. pp. 73–. ISBN 9780979181306. Retrieved 18 March 2014. 7. ^ Grainger, Brett (2009-05-26). In the World but Not of It: One Family's Militant Faith and the History of Fundamentalism in America. Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 147–. ISBN 9780802718648. Retrieved 18 March 2014. Here is the definition for arbitrary. 1. subject to individual will or judgment without restriction; contingent solely upon one's discretion: an arbitrary decision. - "Source: dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/arbitrary" We need to restore balance to the opening statement at a minimum. You cannot have an article that starts with a one-sided bit of propaganda. At the very least, many who read the first paragraph will simply dismiss it immediately for its obvious bias. We need to have an immediate review of these one-sided old earth sources. What do these four sources have to do with virtually all members of the scientific community? These sources are simply irrelevant with the exception of Brett Grainger's use of gallup poll data. Greg Neyman is giving his opinion from an old earth viewpoint about The Global Flood. This has nothing to do with a consensus or poll of those in the scientific community. Brook Wilensky-Lanford is simply writes some of his thoughts on the history of the young earth creation movement in the context of his search for The Garden of Eden. This has nothing to do with a poll or percentage of scientist who disapprove of young earth creation. This source is useless. Lenny Flank is simply writing his opinion on the Intelligent Design Movement. Again, this has nothing to do with a percentage of scientist who support "young earth creation" verses those who support "old earth views". Brett Grainger's book was the only book that I found any real data at the beginning which in fact does not support the opening statement of this article. Here is the data from Brett Grainger's book on page 141. He uses data from a 2004 gallup poll. 45 percent of Americans believe in a literal Genesis. 38 percent of Americans believe God somehow guided evolution. 13 percent of Americans held a purely naturalist view. As you can see, these four sources do not give evidence for what is concluded in the opening statement of this article. Nowhere in these sources did I find "virtually all members of the scientific community" agreeing on anything concluded in that opening statement. In fact the data from Brett Grainger's book would suggest that there are a great number of scientists who believe in a literal Genesis. That would be the most obvious conclusion from the poll data. After all, in 2004, 45 percent of Americans believed in a literal Genesis according to Brett Grainger's book which is one of your sources. Therefore, this article is at risk of being labeled as simply propaganda. The opening statement of this article needs serious scrutiny, and needs to be reviewed. I think this could be considered slanderous, a smear campaign, or perhaps a dubious claim at best. Here is the definition for slander. 2. a malicious, false, and defamatory statement or report: a slander against his good name. "Source: dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/slander" The opening statement simply falsely states its conclusion "virtually all members of the scientific community" without any evidence to support it. What are the poll numbers in actuality? Currently, this is an article with an opening statement that has false conclusions with arbitrary sources. Smear Campaign definition - 1. A plan to discredit a public figure by making false or dubious accusations. "Source: Oxford Dictionaries http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/smear-campaign" Dubious definition - 2 Not to be relied upon; suspect:, "Source: Oxford Dictionaries http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/dubious" This page needs to cease using irrelevant sources. It needs to present facts. Here are the pertinent facts. The latest gallup poll numbers are given in the following article "Source: Gallup Politics, In U.S., 46% Hold Creationist View of Human Origins http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/hold-creationist-view-human-origins.aspx" The gallup poll reveals that 46 percent of College Graduates believe God created humans in present form within last 10,000 years. It also reveals that 25 percent of Postgraduates believe God created humans in present form. Whereas, only 14 percent of College Graduates believe Humans evolved, God had no part in process, and only 29 percent of Postgraduates believe Humans evolved, God had no part in process. Here is the gallup poll data over time. "Source: Gallup, Evolution, Creationism, Intelligent Design http://www.gallup.com/poll/21814/evolution-creationism-intelligent-design.aspx" The Pew Forum has collected data on this subject further showing the false claims of this article as it currently stands as well. "Source: Pew Research, Religion & Public Life Project, Scientists and Belief http://www.pewforum.org/2009/11/05/scientists-and-belief" The Pew Forum has results on who actually believes in God. This is a broad statement about belief in God which makes up a majority of the population. The Pew Forum has also collected similar data on Evolution. "Source: Pew Research, Fact Tank, Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham: Are evolution and religion at odds? http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/02/03/bill-nye-vs-ken-ham-are-evolution-and-religion-at-odds"
Therefore, the false claim of this article "by virtually all members of the scientific community" needs rapid revision according to the data above. The following sentence should be removed quickly. "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" because it is a false assertion. ——————— Lampstand49 ( talk) 10:25, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Lampstand49 ( talk) 10:43, 19 March 2014 (UTC) ——————— Lampstand49
The following sentence should be removed quickly. "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" because it is a false assertion which could be considered slanderous, a smear campaign, or perhaps a dubious claim at best. You may give data from actual polls on the subject, but this page must cease from false claims. I have provided the poll numbers above. Lampstand49 ( talk) 11:20, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Gaba, you need to quit hiding my "well-thought" out talk page comments that other users will be interested in hearing. This violates Wikipedia guidelines. It is a short well-thought out discussion that is relevant to the opening section. Please do not violate Wikipedia guidelines by censoring talk page comments. Lampstand49 ( talk) 12:28, 19 March 2014 (UTC)Gaba, I have been well intentioned from the very start. However, those who have opposing views have chosen to label and collapse my well-thought out text which I had hoped would help reach a consensus. In regards to your supposed "Walloftext", here is what the Wikipedia guidelines read. "Not all long posts are walls of text, some can be nuanced and thoughtful. " - Wikipedia Not too mention, my comments all followed Wikipedia rules and were not very long, not the size of a novel. You should read the guidelines more closely. From the time I posted my comments, several of you immediately labeled and collapsed them. You repeatedly labeled and collapsed my comments. Why? Perhaps, so that they would not be included in reaching a consensus because they do not fit your point of view. What kind of concensus is that which includes only you? By the way, this is why Talk Pages are here? Discussions like these can build friendships. Your friend. Have a great day. Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:53, 19 March 2014 (UTC) |
Issue resolved, let's close this and move on
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We must not claim that this is an opinion. Where it appears, we must WP:ASSERT it plainly without regard for the chatter of those who are offended by such facts for whatever reason. This is not up for debate. jps ( talk) 23:07, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
I don't think StAnselm should be allowed to continue on in this manner. This is very problematic. He is essentially denying basic facts and that is inimical to writing an encyclopedia. I suggest simply ignoring him. Consensus is clearly not on his side.
jps (
talk) 23:46, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Of course there's no debate here, this isn't
Conservapedia. The age of the Earth is a fact as much as its roundness is. Are there improvements still being made to those values?
Of course. Are there people even today claiming the opposite?
Of course. Should we give even a little amount of credence to these ideas?
Of course not.
StAnselm if you want to have a philosophical debate "about what constitutes a scientific "fact"",
you're in the wrong place. And I have to say
jps has a point, you seem to be completely failing
WP:COMPETENCE here and your behaviour is dangerously close to
WP:STONEWALL.
Please post your proposed version (or your support with this one) so we can work towards a consensus one. Regards. Gaba (talk) 00:00, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Very well, based on the comments and applying WP:ASSERT, here's a second stab at a new version of the statement:
I tried to combine my proposal above with jps's proposal. Thoughts? Gaba (talk) 02:07, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Seeing as there is broad consensus for the statement above (6 to 1) I'm requesting the second proposal above be added to the article. To make it clear, the edit is the sentence:
to replace the current one in the lead:
Regards. Gaba (talk) 15:33, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Gaba, you cannot state as a fact that a young age for the earth "is incorrect". You do not know that from Radiometric Dating, the fact is most geologists should know better. You should remove "is incorrect" stated as a fact. This will just drive people to other information sources. It shows extreme bias in this particular article. Lampstand49 ( talk) 15:52, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
I want each of you to know that I love you guys regardless of the outcome here. I know we have very different points of view, but most importantly I want you to know that I love you guys. Seriously. Lampstand49 ( talk) 15:57, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Who was disruptive? Lampstand49 ( talk) 16:16, 19 March 2014 (UTC) |
Violation of WP:TPG |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
——————— Lampstand49 I have an interest in geology because my father was head of The Petroleum Engineering Department at The University of Tulsa. He later became one of the lead Petroleum Consultants at OGCI in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He formed his own Oil and Gas consulting company as well before he passed away. He taught at Imperial College in London, and he also consulted for most of the major oil companies. I have a great interest in geology. Did you know that you cannot confirm the age of the earth from Radiometric Dating? I will ask anyone here to give me the slightest evidence that any of these rock layers are old. That is my challenge to you. When you post your evidence, you should expect my repsonse. Then, we can investigate if a Young Age of the Earth has been debunked as has been stated in this article. A Young Age of the Earth is exactly what we would expect given that The Bible is true. Radiometric Dating simply analyzes decay rates of isotopes. It does not return dates. Any geologist knows this. Every informed geologist also knows that Radiometric Dating has assumptions and faults. Radiometric dating is based on assumptions that are unprovable and plagued with problems. Rocks may inherit isotopes from their sources, and / or they could be contaminated when moving through other rocks to their current resting location. It is possible that inflowing water may have mixed parent or daughter isotopes into the rocks. Radioactive decay rates may have changed or not have been constant. New research does indicates that radioactive elements have decayed at much faster speeds in the past 6,000 years. Since these dating techniques are based on faulty assumptions and lead to unreliable results. For example, they have found "Supposed" 45 thousand yr old fossil wood inside "supposed" 45 million yr old basalt. Obviously, the dates are incorrect. Therefore, these radioactive dates of "Supposed" old ages should not be trusted, not only for these reasons, but they contradict what is written in God's Word for God is the Creator and Eyewitness of the original Creation Events. When you trust in God and you understand some basic science, you can see how these faulty assumptions lead to incorrect dates. The age of the earth is not settled. All of the following men believed in a literal Genesis: Galileo Galilei (Improved the telescope, supported Copernicanism and the father of modern physics), Johann Kepler (third principle of planetary motion, contributed to the field of optics,analyzed the workings of the human eye,the volume of solid bodies), John Wilkins(founder of The Royal Society), Walter Charleton(President of the Royal College of Physicians), Blaise Pascal(Theory of probability, Hydrostatics, Barometer and conic sections), Sir William Petty(Statistician and scientiest), Robert Boyle(Chemistry and Gas Dynamics), John Ray(Natural Histoy), Isaac Barrow(developer of infinitesimal calculus), Nicolas Steno(Stratigraphy), Thomas Burnet(Geologist), Increase Mather(President of Harvard University 1692-1701), Nehemiah Grew(Physiologist and pioneer of dactyloscopy), Sir Isaac Newton(Calculus, Dynamics, Gravitation Law, Reflecting Telescope, Spectrum of Light, Three laws of motion, Theory of universal gravitation, Wrote extensively on The Bible),Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz( Law of Continuity and Transcendental Law of Homogeneity, infinitesimal calculus) and John Flamsteed(The first Astronomer Royal). Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:04, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:04, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
For those intterested, I've opened a thread regarding Lampstand49's disruptive use of the article's talk page edit warring to un-collapse his walls of text here: Lampstand49 reported by User:Gaba. Regards. Gaba (talk) 14:22, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Gaba, I have been well intentioned from the very start. However, those who have opposing views have chosen to label and collapse my well-thought out text which I had hoped would help reach a consensus. In regards to your supposed "Walloftext", here is what the Wikipedia guidelines read. "Not all long posts are walls of text, some can be nuanced and thoughtful. " - Wikipedia Not too mention, my comments all followed Wikipedia rules and were not very long, not the size of a novel. You should read the guidelines more closely. From the time I posted my comments, several of you immediately labeled and collapsed them. You repeatedly labeled and collapsed my comments. Why? Perhaps, so that they would not be included in reaching a consensus because they do not fit your point of view. What kind of concensus is that which includes only you? Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:41, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
My comments were thoughtful with poll numbers and information about past scientists which could really help the balance of the article. I appropriately put my comments on the Talk Page in a thoughtful manner. I am here to help the group reach a more informed consensus so that the article is balanced. As it currently stands, the article has false information. I never said anyone had to use the poll information that I have provided which show the current article to be false. With that said, I was censored by a couple of people in this group who were disruptive because they were collapsing all of my comments. Lampstand49 ( talk) 15:26, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
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Please add as the final sentence of the final paragraph in the "Career" section:
References
-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:34, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
|newspaper=The Guardian
|location=London
I would also amend |last=Zack Kopplin
to |first=Zack
|last=Kopplin
I would also avoid a generic name for the ref (i.e. name="Guardian"
) because that has a high potential for duplication; instead I would use a more specific name like name="Guardian20140204"
or just omit it entirely. --
Redrose64 (
talk) 20:02, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
|answered=no
) and I'll do it. I unwatched this page because of the disagreements below. --
Redrose64 (
talk) 10:31, 24 March 2014 (UTC)![]() | This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
71.178.194.11 ( talk) 18:51, 21 March 2014 (UTC) The sentence "His claim about the young age of the Earth, based on his interpretation of the Bible, is incorrect and dismissed as such by the scientific community" is bias towards evolutionist and untrue.
{{
edit protected}}
template. --
Redrose64 (
talk) 22:28, 21 March 2014 (UTC)Rehash of almost all of the discussions above
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The current wording "His claim about the young age of the Earth, based on his interpretation of the Bible, is incorrect" seems rather unencyclopedic. Elsewhere on Wikipedia we have wording like:
I would suggest that the previous wording "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" is better than what we have now. -- 101.117.77.33 ( talk) 00:50, 22 March 2014 (UTC) |
![]() | This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
It seems that certain people are hell-bent on censoring any kind of comment on these talk pages.
While I agree that the main pages should be kept clean and that damage caused by vandals should be repaired, these pages should not be censored and any opinions expressed here should not be oppressed in the way in which they are being. Otherwise, what is the point of having talk pages?
All I did was ask a simple question. Clearly, some people did not like the question and think of themselves as superior. Clearly they have an ego problem. Clearly, anyone who points out that they have an ego problem is automatically in the wrong because we don't want to admit to themselves how conceited they really are now do we!
No doubt that this comment will also be removed because it offends one of those conceited people. I truly pity them. They are small people.
I initially removed Intelligent Design as a "see more" link because Ken Ham and AiG generally do not support ID from my understanding of them (ID is not the same as Young Earth Creationism). But I'm not going to get into an edit war over it. -- Fastfission 00:27, 6 Jul 2004 (UTC)
FastFission, while I agree with you that ID is not the same thing as YEC, it is however related to the creation/evolution controversy, and thus probably should be included. But I agree, it's not worth an edit-war. :-
Removed 'see also' as it pertains to Answers in Genesis, not Ken Ham agapetos_angel 09:24, 8 August 2005 (UTC) Ditto for the 'creation museum' section; it was already present (and better written) on the AiG article, the more appropriate place agapetos_angel 01:23, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
In response to the recent edits on contradictions in the Bible.
1) If you spend as much time as I have looking through the Answers in Genesis website then you'll see that AiG has addressed at least some of the apparent contradictions in Genesis. Sorry I don't have the references at the moment- if you're really desperate I can look for them.
2) I'm not certain whether it's NPOV to claim that there exist 'contradictions' as opposed to 'apparent contradictions'. In a literary text such as the Bible- context is everything and it is usually possible to argue that black is white given context and interpretation. I'm not saying that's a good thing.
3) To be scrupulously fair- there are many apparently contradictory phenomena in science- that doesn't mean that they're wrong- it sometimes means that we just aren't smart enough to understand the situation. For instance quantum mechanics and general relativity are almost universally acknowledged to be contradictory in some situations. That doesn't necessarily invalidate the worth of either.
4) Biblical literalists don't always claim that they have all the answers and will sometimes openly admit that they aren't smart enough to explain a contradiction. I think credit is due to them for that. There's a big difference between that position and the one of actively ignoring the problem and misdirecting people.
I think we're almost there. It's appropriate to cite skeptical sources which point out (apparent or not) contradictions in Genesis. Be a little bit careful about accusing Ham or AiG of ignoring these contradictions (whatever you think of Ham, I'm sure he knows Genesis inside-out).
Thanks for your input Christianjb 15:44, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
1. Some contradictions are, as you say, addressed on the AiG website (go there and search for 'contradictions'). However, Ham insists upon literal interpretations when they suit his point of view, and disputes the text when it doesn't suit. Apart from the contradictions in the text, his approach to the reading of it is contradictory too.
2. The contradictions are quite straightforward, there's not much to be apparent about!
I'd like to add some reference material to his assertions about belief in evolution 'causing' the evils in society, specifically, to back up my claim that these 'evils' are more common in states where a belief in creationism is more common. See [1] and elsewhere.
Firstly I strongly disapprove of anon edits and the news today shows that Wikipedia feels the same way. This especially holds true for controversial pages.
Secondly, you can't win here (in my opinion). You're arguing against Ham's theology, which is his interpretation and subjective view- not yours. Yes it may be entirely inconsistent- but isn't every theology (at least to others)? Christianjb 04:09, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Finally, most of your information is (or should be) already available on the Alleged inconsistencies in the Bible and other more appropriate pages. Let's just link there. Christianjb 12:06, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
I made a number of edits today -- most of them superficial, style, etc., such as moving & resizing an image, clearing up the external links section, removing lonely subsections (to clarify reading of the table of contents), and so forth. I made a number of edits that seem to be reflecting the consensus of talk page commenters, but may not be entirely -- I had a little trouble following the discussion through some of the juxtaposed comments. I do not intend to start an edit war. So, concerning the more major edits:
A. I renamed the "Criticisms" section "Criticisms of Ham", so that it is more clear that that space is not for general criticisms of creationism, Young-Earth creationism, or Answers in Genesis.
B. I removed this block of text:
"The text of Genesis contains apparent contradictions (e.g. [2] and [3]) and critics claim that a literalist interpretation of the text cannot therefore be possible, as it requires some of the text's assertions to be discarded in favour of other ones. This is sometimes countered by the philosophy that in an inerrant text it must be the interpretations which are wrong, and it is usally possible to find interpretations which resolve the contradictions. In particular, Answers in Genesis has addressed this issue [4], but skeptics generally view such explanations as post-hoc rationalization."
"Critics of Ham also express concern that the Book of Genesis can be used to promote a 'pro-family' agenda. Genesis firstly contains the story of Cain who killed his own brother Abel in a fit of envy. In the story of the Ark, Noah fails to plead for the lives of any of his relatives and family members when told by God of the flood that is to envelop the earth. This is in marked contrast to Abraham who asks God to reconsider the punishment against the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah should ten good men be found. One of Noah's sons then discovers his father naked while drunk and calls for assistance from his brothers to bring some dignity to the old man, for this he is cursed by Noah. Later on we find Abraham taking a concubine in Hagar when his own wife cannot have children. When Sarah does conceive, Abraham sends Hagar and his young son Ismael into the desert and almost certain death (had God not saved them). In the story of Joseph, Dinah is raped but her father Jacob shows almost no concern. There are many more instances in Genesis that suggest the promotion of traditions against modern day 'family values'."
for the following reasons:
1. Block A discusses Genesis contradictions and issues of biblical inerrancy, but does not even mention Ham. This would be better on the Answers in Genesis page or on the articles about Genesis or Biblical Inerrancy. It is my understanding that other users agree that this section does not fit with a biographical article, hence, why I'm proceeding with the removal.
2. Block B mentions Ham only in passing -- "critics of Ham also express concern" while focusing on stories in Genesis. Not only would this be more approriate on another page, but it also cites no external references that contain this critique. This text would be better on the Answers in Genesis page, for example, Answers_in_Genesis#Criticism.
C. There were some duplicate statements made in the text on Ham's writings that were both out-of-place and already listed in the Criticisms section (for example, "None of Ham's scientific analyses have been accepted into mainstream peer-reviewed scientific journals and they lie completely outside of mainstream science", in the Writings section, was removed because "Ham's stance on scientific matters have not been subjected to peer-reviewed analysis in mainstream scientific journals" is the opening sentence in the Criticisms section.
There might be a tendency to post criticisms of Young-Earth creationism, biblical inerrancy, or Answers in Genesis on this page when they should be focused on the aforementioned pages. As a biographical page, criticisms should focus on statements specifically made by Ham (including citations), actions undertaken by Ham, etc., rather than focusing on criticisms of more "widespread" beliefs Ken Ham holds ("widespread" in the sense that he is not the sole person holding those beliefs, and that those beliefs, therefore, have a separate page listing allegations about their own merits).
This edit was in good faith -- please revert/revise if I've acted too rashly. AnDrew McKenzie 17:05, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Is Ken Ham the President of just the USA AIG. I know he is its founder but if he is not incharge of the Australia AIG and British AIG then who is? Falphin 01:53, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
It seems to me that the part where it is stated that Mr. Ham's arguments are hotly debated in the skeptic community is not only inaccurate, but a flatout lie. His arguments are the standard young earth creationist arguments (be they more carefully stated than the arguments by fellow YEC Kent Hovind) and do NOT form a hot topic.
Secondly it seems to me that the addition of the word atheist (nearly as a form of slander) is of very limited value and gives the entire criticism section an inflammatory and slanted feel.
-- Jerom 16:21, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
This sentence is baffling: "Ham believes that evolutionary theory has contributed to the rise of humanism, racism, eugenics, euthanasia, pornography, homosexuality, family breakup, abortion, and more".
What's wrong with humanism? Was it supposed to be the bad "secular humanism"? Or was it to say "evolution sparks good and bad things"?
Oh, that is right. Creationists, along with most conservative Christians see relative morality (in particular humanist style morality) as dangerous. They hold that only absolute, Christian morality has any place, and should be above all human or relative concerns.
Pal sch 13:34, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
Ban all of these stupid people. 24.144.51.28 ( talk) 16:22, 15 February 2013 (UTC)
I just added the section about Ken Ham's daily radio broadcast. This is my first wiki contribution and I am open to criticisms of how I could have done this better. Dennis Fuller 15:29, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
This is an encyclopedia entry not a blog for personal views. Encyclopedia entries don't make judgments on the appropriateness of someone's salary or discourage it's readers from making donations.
Beside the blatant POV pushing, this section is poorly sourced. The NPTimes is a survey of 209 non-profits who voluntarily responded to the survey. CharityNavigator has a study from 4,000 charities that are required to make their financial information publicly available. If you look at CharityNavigator's CEO compensation study, you will see that Ken Ham's pay falls right in line with the averages compared to other charities with similar revenue.
Also, the salaries that were posted for other staff members are not sourced. Even if they can be sourced, there is nothing extraordinary about what they are being paid.
See this webpage. DennisF 15:59, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
I've added Their Own Version of a Big Bang - Los Angeles Times directly under the ext. links heading as it's pretty neutral and didn't fit any of the subheadings. ... dave souza, talk 10:43, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
To do list: MoS the 'Writings' section to 'Bibliography' (with ISBN) and 'External links'. agapetos_angel 02:43, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
I added some of what Ham teaches to children (from the LA Times article) in the Teachings category. I was not logged in when I did it. Oops. Mr Christopher 22:39, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
The recent edit in the section criticizing Ham for teaching children to distrust evolutionists needs to be reworked. I think it is a valid criticism but needs to be written correctly. As it stands, this section is a violation of No Original Research. As editors, we should not be gathering information to criticize Ham and make an analysis that reflects our POV, we should find other reliable sources that make the charge and report their analysis. DennisF 14:28, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
The edit I made quotes Ham so the evidence that he has children choose between God or science is obvious. Have you read his web site or his literature? And quoting him and what he teaches is not criticizing. You might try studying the guy this is not the first time he has made statements like that. And the scientific community overwhelmingly recognizes evolution as the best explanation for biology.
Sure there are other like Ham who reject scientific answers there are also people who believe the world is flat or that magnets can cure cancer. That does not make either notion true. The fact remains the bible is not a science book, dinosaurs predated mankind, and the world's age is measured in billions of years and not thousands. Pointing out Ham feels differently is not criticizing him nor does it reflect a POV, the evidence supports it.
If you have evidence that Ham teaches children legitimate scientific principles or that he encourages children to trust the scientific method then bring that evidence to this article. Mr Christopher 15:48, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Also, what if we put some stuff in like "Like other young earth creationists, Ham distrusts the scientific method and therefore believes in the literal interpretation of the Book of Genisis. In some of his speeches he encourages children to share his distrust for science and science teachers" and then quote him? Would that seem more accurate? Mr Christopher 15:53, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
I am not emotionally attached to anything I have written, so if it can be improved feel free to work with it. I hear some of your disagreement(s) with some of my comments and I have some ideas on how to rework some of it but I am short on time right now so if you have some ideas on improving it, by all means hop in there. I think what Ham teaches and who he teaches it to is very relevant yet I recognize I might not be articulating that very well. And from what his literature and published quotes of him suggest he is above all promoting the bible as the final authority on all matters, and in this case science. That is neither good nor bad, it is simply relevant I think. Mr Christopher 03:55, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
Are honorary degrees considered education? Is there a reference to a standard within Wikipedia? Ted 13:16, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
I question if Ham was ever a faculty member at Liberty. Are there any sources for this? DennisF 18:11, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Honorary degrees should not be included under "Education." They are not education in any real sense of the word. I have put them back in "Honors." I wouldn't feel bad about deleting them entirely, since most of the entries of people I have looked at who I know have honorary degrees don't have them listed. Ted 05:31, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
"Ham (and other creationists) believe...". We should not write this unless all other creationists also believe this, which I hope it is obvious that they do not. Can I remove it? DJ Clayworth 20:23, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
I really don't think that the criticisms of Ken Ham are valid. His question "were you there?" is quite literate. We can see changes in the fossil record, but we can't witness them happening now. And that wouldn't debunk creationism, because, in Ken Ham's own words, "I know someone who was there." Do evolutionists know anyone who "was there"? Ratso 14:54, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
Since there were no objections, I've added a tentative countercriticism paragraph. Please note, since I do agree with Ham/AIG on those issues, it's possible I haven't worded it neutrally enough; please check that, anyone, though I tried to fit NPOV as best I could. Also, anyone have a citation for the Hugh Ross vs. Ken Ham public debate? The only Ross debate with actual AIG staff I'm aware of was with Dr. Lisle, not Ham, at least as far as I can find. It's possible whoever wrote that was confusing Lisle for Ham. Also, if there are any countercriticisms to the countercriticisms, those should be included, as I understand it, so general callout if anyone knows of any (as said above, I've never found any myself). -- Bonesiii 06:07, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
Why is No Answers in Genesis listed here? They are far less respected the AiG. I tried to remove it, but someone reverted the change.--
Djdpmd 19:38, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
Hey! Ken ham goes to my church! PopiethePopester 14:29, 5 April 2006 (UTC) PopiethePopester
What does the quote "very, very submissive, supportive wife" add to this article? The article is not about Ham's wife, nor about his opinions of family life. It is about Ham, and his role as an advocate of Creationism. I have not seen anything like this on other biographical articles, and there are dozens of equally (ir)relevant quotes you could add to the article - such as the one I added. I see the selctions of this particular snippet for inclusion, and the exclsuion of other quotes about his wife from the same source, as a subtle attempt to poison the well. WaysAndMeans 18:53, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
If Ham talks about his private life in public then that's fair game for Wikipedia to discuss it. — Dunc| ☺ 10:50, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
What does the quote "very, very submissive, supportive wife" add to this article? Good question. Including this quotation gives the reader a bit of insight into
Ken Ham's worldview. The reader can then make her own inferences regarding
what kind of person Ken Ham is. The reader can then decide whether or not the man — or his ideas — are worthy of respect or admiration. This is one of the primary functions of any biography.
If this was some sort of miss quote, slip of the tongue or a comment made during some sort of journalistic windup during an interview then I would agree that it should go. But it wasn't, I bet if you were to ask him in a very relaxed setting whether his wife was 'very, very submissive' and whether this was something virtuous then he would say yes. He would be quite proud of this comment and the context that it was used. I think that's a valuable incite into his family life and his views on women. I suspect if this quote was in reference to Joseph Smith or even Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (President of Iran) you wouldn't mind.
Smooshable2 (
talk) 22:51, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
The problem I have with this quote "very, very submissive" is the implied contact. Ken was asked to talk about his wife and family. His response is over 400 words describing his appreciation for his wife and family supporting him and supporting the fact that he is often on the road. The entire sentiment of the reponse is one of appreciation for support. Boiling it down to "very, very submissive" is misrespresenting and misleading the audience. I expected to go to the article and read more about how Ken felt the wife should be a submissive partner, because that is how the quote reads, but that the type of response he gave. I believe a more approriate discreption is in his summary statement "a very special wife who wants to always support me and support the children". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wildcatgrad ( talk • contribs) 21:04, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
Way too many people are angrily berating Christians and Creationists because they disagree. Please, everyone be civil. If you can't handle an opposing argument, start your own blog and blast creationists all day. Keep it to the facts here, not heresay.
A reminder to all parties, this talk page is not for arguing about Ham or AIG. It is about discussing ways to improve the article. Also note that Ham is still alive, so WP:BLP applies to this talk page. JoshuaZ 06:28, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
I have an issue with the sentence in the Beliefs' section: Ham does accept that natural selection can give rise to a number of species from an original population, provided that all of these species are of the same kind (a term borrowed from Genesis 1:11 and elsewhere). '...A term borrowed from Genesis...' needs to mention a translation, as obviously, not all translations use the word 'kind'. And what does 'elsewhere' mean? Ashmoo 03:18, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
"Regarding his beliefs, Ham has told audiences, "If you disagree with what I'm going to say, please do not give me your opinion, because I'm not interested."[21]"
This is incredibly misleading. I'm no fan of the guy, but I checked out the link assigned to footnote 21, and he's speaking specifically to people who want to justify racism on the grounds that black and white people are a different race. It was to those people that he said don't tell me your views, I'm not interested. It's not true that he said here that he was uninterested in diverse beliefs in general, as this passage tries to imply. —Preceding unsigned comment added by BurkeDevlin ( talk • contribs) 21:48, 18 March 2009 (UTC)
Wasn't it a picture of a ham instead of a hat? I don't think a hat can be a fossil since it is nonliving. If I'm wrong please correct me.
I could have sworn that it was a ham. It's been over a year since I've seen the videos though. Maybe I'm just getting old.-- Jim Shorts 15:18, 17 March 2007 (UTC)Jim Shorts
I'm not sure why AiG's cricitism of Kent Hovind is present under the "criticism section," given that Hovind himself did not criticise Ken Ham or AiG. Find a secondary source which states that "certain critics do not endorse AiG's criticism of other YEC orgs" or something if you want it to be in the article.
Yoda921 05:38, 14 April 2007 (UTC)Yoda
I am removing the section on Talk.Origins. This is a biography on Ham, not what others think about him.--
Djdpmd 01:11, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
I am manually undoing the edits by Abiller68 regarding the AIG-CMI dispute. They are uncited, inaccurate and POV. The CMI lawsuit was filed on 31 May 07 (according to the copy of the actual claim filed), and the Creation Museum ribbon cutting ceremony was on 26 May 07 (according to AIG and Wikipedia’s own article on the Creation Museum). Something that occurred AFTER an event cannot possibly have occurred on the eve of that event. The addition of the “on the eve…” comment is almost a direct quote from AIG and is highly emotive, which makes me wonder just who Abiller68 actually is. There has been no documentation provided or referenced to indicate that AIG initiated binding arbitration of any kind at any time, or that CMI refused such. There is documentation available (already referenced in the article) which indicates that the opposite is true (i.e. the actual roles are reversed), although this documentation is provided by CMI themselves. Ultimately, we now have a situation where both parties have claimed that the other party has refused arbitration. Until something is published that firmly establishes one party’s refusal to enter binding arbitration, reporting this whichever way around amounts to POV. As a Christian and Young Earth Creationist I find this whole dispute tragic and frankly nauseating. However, since it is going to be included in Wikipedia articles it should be dealt with in the proper NPOV manner. I do notice that Abiller68’s only contributions were this same edit in the AIG and Ken Ham articles, and there is no user page. Again, I wonder who Abiller68 actually is. LowKey ( talk) 05:19, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
I have undone a couple of edits at the beginning of the criticism section. The edits inserted POV by asserting that creationism (and/or ID) is not accepted by "any" or "any major" scientific organisations. This gets into the problems of defining scientific. Many anti-creationists assert that any individual or group cannot by definition be both scientific and creationist. Then there will be the edit wars about creationists not being scientists because they do not publish in peer reviewed journals, as long as we disqualify any journal that publishes creationist research on the grounds that it if it does, then it is not scientific. The discussions (and indeed the individual arguments) become circular. Also, define major – if you dare, more edit war fodder. The entry was fine as it was. It made the point that creationism is scientifically unpopular. It allows readers to insert their own assumptions AFTER the text (which is where they should be). LowKey ( talk) 23:10, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
Anyone have a cite for this comment about the ICR? I don't know a lot about creationism, but this article from Contra Mundum at http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/CMBergman.html just slaps it into a "Other Creationist Groups" heading. Random name 15:33, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
Image:Ken Ham head shot.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.
Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.
If there is other other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. BetacommandBot 22:20, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
Wait, do you mean that people want more pics of Ken Ham but can't get any? I went to the Creation Museum last Summer and have two pics, if anyone wants to post them or something. Dinotitan ( talk) 18:42, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
Is Ham still an Australian citizen? Or has he gained U.S. citizenship during the two decades that he has lived in the states? Or is he just a permanent U.S. resident? Not that it makes much different, but if he has gained American citizenship it'd be worth including in the biographical portion of the article. Does anyone know? Jacob1207 05:11, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I should have done some more research first. A quick search turned up on this Ham quote: "I continue to be an Australian citizen, and I still hold an Australian passport though I am a legal resident of the United States." [6] That's from a March 17, 1999 letter. Worth putting in the article? Jacob1207 05:26, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Hmm the article now says he's just annouced he has obtained US citizenship, but I can't find this anywhere. Ref anyone? Random name 19:51, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
I added a brief description of the Creation Museum, since Ken Ham was prominently featured in virtually all the publicity surrounding its opening, and I linked to the main Creation Museum entry. I tried to be as NPOV as possible, and I would defend my phrasing that an essential feature of the Creation Museum is that it uses the "vocabulary, if not the methodology, of science". Happy to entertain suggestions for improvement, however. Talkingtomypocket 20:45, 1 July 2007 (UTC)
A link to a prank interview with Ken Ham was recently added to the entry. I am going to remove it, as I believe it has no place in an encyclopedia. Also, it is not "Offical and Pro Ham", the title of the section. Self-congratulatory stunts have plenty of other places to be featured. This is not a blog or a place for links that a particular crowd finds amusing. Talkingtomypocket 20:03, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
Are there any particular cites you feel are being used which don't actually match up to the areas they're in? The article has certainly gotten cite-heavy, as it seems like every time I visit this page, someone has placed requests for cites on yet another area of the page, often in areas where a cite hardly seems worth the trouble. (The number of children he has seems like an obvious example.) Random name 20:43, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the Ken Ham article from Category:Christian ministers since the assertion appears unsupported. Per AiG, "Ken Ham is not 'Rev.' Ham. He is not a pastor, does not lead a church, and has never been ordained." [7] That Answers in Genesis identifies itself as an "apologetics ministry" does not make it's head a minister. As the term is used in contemporary Christianity, a food bank would usually be considered a ministry, but the person handing out for food wouldn't therefore be a minister in the sense one usually uses the word. Jacob1207 ( talk) 22:56, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
Is this important? It seems to me that it was put in the article to make ken ham seem corrupt. I don't see how his income is really relevant to the article in any other way. -- BenSven Talk 22:08, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
As explained on the edit page, I think citing a person's salary really ought to be justified. It is not sufficient to cite a source that confirms the accuracy of the information. The source ought to demonstrate that the information is relevant, and the formerly-cited Charity Navigator source fails to do so. I conducted a cursory scan of dozens of other biographical wikis and I found zero articles that cite a person's salary, aside from Ken Ham's. Considering the controversial character of this article it would be prudent to avoid appearance of bias.
I propose that we follow the typical biography pattern, unless someone cites a reliable source that demonstrates the relevance of this additional information. DummySean ( talk) 16:05, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
We should give the salary. There are two reasons why your arguments are wrong: (1) It is not appropriate to expect an independent source that demonstrates that the figure is relevant. The source can be used to justify the figure, but not necessarily its relevance. It is up to the editors of wikipedia to consider its relevance. (2) Unusual, interesting or controversial salaries and earnings are often given in wikipedia. Steve Jobs' salary is $1. Sol Trujillo's salary was $13 million. Members of the Canadian House of Commons received $155,400 in 2008. Interpret those figures how you will. In my opinion, Ken Ham's salary is relevant information to readers---in my view, it is interesting because it is unusually high for someone with a teacher's training; others may find it interesting for different reasons. DJP ( talk) —Preceding undated comment added 23:31, 9 June 2009 (UTC).
I added a POV tag to the criticism section. I especially have a problem with the statement "His arguments have not gained acceptance with any major scientific organization." Unless a source is provided this statement should be removed. It seems this section has just become an area to talk about how much you don't like Ken Ham. It should be balanced out and reworded to meet Wikipedia's neutrality standards. Kristamaranatha ( talk) 02:17, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
I have just reverted an edit attributing to AIG (and by extension Ken Ham) the endorsement of a "literal" belief in God's Word. As Ken Ham, AiG, CMI and other YEC orgs and individuals have stated repeatedly, they subscribe to a "straightforward" or "plain" interpretation, which is very different to "literal". "Straightforward" means that one treats texts according to their literary features. Imagery is treated as imagery, poetry is treated as poetry, and histrocial narrative is treated as historical narrative. This means that there are texts which are to be read literally, and texts which are not. Open a magazine and start reading any random page, and you very quickly determine whether you are reading poetry, fictional narrative, historical narrative etc. You read the page in a straightforward manner but you may or may not read it literally. LowKey ( talk) 00:02, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Look, you seem not to have read your own position on this talk, which I responded to. Above YOU wrote: "they subscribe to a 'straightforward' or 'plain' interpretation, which is very different to 'literal'." I replied that this is mere semantics that should not be in the article.
My comments referred to your claims, NOT your edit. So your misguided and ill-informed attack doesn't fit here.
Obviously, this passage was meant to be taken as speaking of a total of seven literal days based on the Creation Week of six literal days of work and one literal day of rest. Ken Ham, December 20, 2007
and
There’s an inconsistency here in taking Genesis literally to accept sin to explain moral evil, such as the shootings at Virginia Tech, but not taking Genesis literally in their acceptance of millions of years of “natural evil” before man (e.g., death, violence, catastrophe, and extinction of animals). Ken Ham, President, AiG-US April 16, 2007
and the following is the very definition of Biblical literalism:
We need to realize that the Bible is God's Word. And as it is the inspired Word of the infinite Creator, God, then it must be self-authenticating and self-attesting. Thus, we should always start with what God's Word says regardless of outside ideas. Only God's Word is infallible. Ken Ham, December 1995
If you want more quotes from Ken Ham about literal Genesis, I suggest you try google. If you want to play semantics, I also suggest a forum. We66er ( talk) 21:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
The Daily Show statement makes WP look cheap. "Poking Fun" is not a criticism. Parody May be used as criticism, but it by no means safe to assume that it always is. What this needs is a RS ABOUT the Daily Show spoof stating what criticism it was making. Either a 3rd party review or a Daily Show summary of some sort would do the trick. LowKey ( talk) 05:20, 8 September 2008 (UTC)
I am thinking of working up a general description of the CMI-AiG dispute that covers the basics without getting into to much detail. I aim to replace the sections in the articles for CMI, AiG, CW and KH with this same general description, an emphasising the link to the Dispute article. The dispute article would then have all the relevant information in one place making it easier for editors to update, and to avoid inconsistencies. The sections get quite out of date the way they are, probably because it is a pain to go around updating the same info in at least 4 articles.
I would thus be moving some statements into the dispute article that are not currently included. I don't plan to drop any statements, so initially the dispute article will be a union of all the current sections. Any objections? This same "notice" is going into the other articles as well LowKey ( talk) 01:57, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
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Since Ham is an Old Testament biblical name, from where does Ken Ham's surname originate? Is it his birth name? -- 83.253.250.70 ( talk) 11:27, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
This might be worth mentioning as Ken Ham's ministry took pictures of license plates/bumpers to and he posted them online. C56C ( talk) 18:21, 16 August 2009 (UTC)
Is "Myers posted an account of the tour on his blog, and condemned the venue for "promoting the Hamite theory of racial origins, that ugly idea that all races stemmed from the children of Noah, and that black people in particular were the cursed offspring of Ham." [1] This led to post exchanges between Myers and Ham, who retorted, "Not only do we not teach such an absurd idea (that sadly has been used by some to promote racism and prejudice against dark skinned people), we teach against it." [2] [3]" necessary? This seems like a minor blog fight that doesn't serve much purpose havign all these details in. PZ's trip was covered in independent reliable sources but after that this is all just various blogs back and forth. JoshuaZ ( talk) 22:37, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
Given Ham's long track record of promoting Creation science (including founding or working for a number of organisations with 'Creation Science' or 'Creation Research' in their titles), it strikes me as incongruous that no mention of CS is made in the lead. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 03:14, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
I don't see how this is relevant to Ham particularly so I've removed it. There is an article on Creation Museum and I see this is already there. I see no reason why it should be here as well. Auntie E. ( talk) 05:10, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
The section on the Creation Museum should ideally be a distilled version of the article on it. To have a whole paragraph in the section devoted to this visit is undue weight. Auntie E. ( talk) 05:13, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
I have double-tagged the claim that "one of the oldest[10] American Creationist organisations" as:
Therefore, unless somebody can come up with a quote showing the source said this, or an alternative source, I intend downloading this claim fairly quickly. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 03:01, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
I came this article after a Google search. There were several childish edits I replaced with copied original sentences from the reference material. Duensing11 ( talk) 04:09, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
The Further Reading section is out of control. There should of course be external links to KH's own website, a biography (if it existed), etc. but the current KH-minded, YEC-friendly "reading list" seems completely out of line with WP standards. George Washington, Billy Graham, or Robert Oppenheimer have nothing like this.
I'd remove it at once but I don't want to be seen as a vandal by making such a sweeping edit so I'll wait a small period for discussion/consensus. -- Petzl ( talk) 01:31, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
None of these books appear to proffer any information on the topic of Ken Ham, so none of them are appropriate 'Further reading'. They appear to be works by Ham, so the more prominent of them may be appropriate for a 'Works' section. In the meantime, I'm moving the list here to talk. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 02:44, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
[End of removed material. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 02:44, 16 December 2010 (UTC) ]
Sorry, but I screwed up the last sentence in an attempt to fix it. Please, somebody who knows how to get rid of box, help. Desoto10 ( talk) 00:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
Removed " Dear Emma B a response to Ken Ham at Pharyngula" from the External Links section, as it is a blog post of a personal view on a comment of Ken Ham.
If we add such polemical links there, we should balance that we the inclusion of arguments of the other side (at least a post such as Are “Science” Blogs Really Science Blogs? pertaining to the topic).
Aoszkar ( talk) 12:39, 27 September 2011 (UTC)
Not sure I see the point to including the above paragraph in the Biography section of Ken Ham's article: it shows Ham's salary increase and the fact that he has several family members on the AiG payroll. Yes, we can infer much from this data. Nevertheless, I don't see how this data and the inferences are wikipedia-worthy.-- Petzl ( talk) 02:54, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
Most of what I've found on the Internet seems to have been copied verbatim from Wikipedia and the statement here is copied whole-cloth from this page at Answers In Genesis. Which is indeed used as reference in outdated mirrors of this page elsewhere. As such some sleuthing in the revision history shows this to be the point at which the pertinent reference and the framing statement were removed. I see no problem in reinstating these again albeit having rewritten them. Do note however that doing a site search via Google on the pertinent universities' sites brings up no relevant results. As far as the extent of my capabilities go, there is no relatively straightforward independent verification. It may just be the case that the pertinent records haven't been released online. Dracontes ( talk) 21:54, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
Noticed a really good addition to the lede today while viewing my watchlist. I went and read the citation left to prove this edit. "an evolution denialist viewpoint that is unsupported by scientific evidence." I see now that it is being contended. I think it is totally supported and wanted to stop lurking and give my two cents. Sgerbic ( talk) 00:03, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
Maunus: I find your argument to be utterly tendentious and without merit. Hrafn Talk Stalk( P) 04:18, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
Creationism is clearly against the scientific consensus, and the linked YEC article should say so, but I don't think each and every biographical article on a creationist needs a lengthy pro-evolution disclaimer in the lede. I've noticed a disturbing trend where defending the consensus view becomes so important in biographical articles that providing accurate information about the actual person takes second place. -- 202.124.72.243 ( talk) 13:26, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview. It should define the topic, establish context, explain why the topic is interesting or notable, and summarize the most important points—including any prominent controversies.
— WP:LEDE (my emphasis)
Alright, let's discuss it. I don't think the sentence "In 2005, The Daily Show poked fun at Ham's question." should be included in the Beliefs section of this article because Ham's comments have been made fun many times, and this is just one of them. In this case, nothing of importance is being added to the conversation. The video clip just shows a clip of Ham in the Moment of Zen section of The Daily Show, a segment where a bizarre/funny/ridiculous video is played without any commentary whatsoever. So where is the relevance of including this bit of information here? Trinitresque ( talk) 04:31, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
Per WP:SPS we can believe Ken when he says he does a radio show—but the 600 radio stations is an extraordinary claim beyond the normal so it is an undue weight problem. I believe him, but the source is insufficient for the claim. Could editors please find a source not connected with Ken's work that notes this (a Christian organisation outside of Ken's own organisations would be sufficient). Fifelfoo ( talk) 03:17, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
Almost half of the references here are to his own websites? Article desperately needs some reliable third party references. Theroadislong ( talk) 16:48, 4 September 2012 (UTC)
I have removed the recently-added "pseudoscience" paragraph that another editor has objected to. Skepdic.com is not an appropriate source for a BLP. While it may be better to find a better source for the claim, any such criticism should be specific to Ham himself. This sort of thing has been discussed before, (e.g. Talk:Ken Ham/Archive 1#Evolution Denialist) and controversial additions that have been challenged should not be re-added until a consensus can be reached. St Anselm ( talk) 06:07, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
I propose auto archiving for this talk page, using MiszaBot for threads over 180 days with 7 threads remaining. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 22:14, 2 November 2013 (UTC)
I'm going to use ClueBot III as MiszaBot is out of order. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 00:59, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
I think the phrase "implying that knowledge of unwitnessed events requires direct observation rather than inference" is misleading about his intent. Based on my (non-NPOV caveat) understanding of ideas, he means more along the lines of "the lack of direct observation of events leaves doubt." In other words, he believes that our present scientific knowledge cannot fully account for unobserved events. I do not have a third-party source to back that up. (two cents) 76.125.24.47 ( talk) 15:55, 6 February 2014 (UTC)
Discussion occurring below on proposed edits to the article. Please direct your attention there instead.
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The sentence, "His claims of the age of the earth that are counter to all scientific reports have been widely criticized and debunked." has been repeatedly removed from the lead without discussion here. First once an edit is reverted it is appropriate per WP:BRD to bring the subject to the talk page. Second the sentence is supported by four sources. Third it is a summary of substantial content in the body of the article. Fourth it reflects a significant aspect of the subject. Please present policy based rationale if you wish to remove or edit it. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 13:23, 18 March 2014 (UTC) Everything on there that is a fact I don't dispute and is in the criticism section of this article already. This is a living person article and criticism like that does not belong in the first lead paragraph. Also it is an opinion not a fact. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.178.43.177 ( talk) 13:28, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
That is from one point of view. The whole sentence seems to bring it to a conclusion. I don't dispute that he has widespread criticism even from christians. He does. If it has been debunked when why would Bill Nye bother debating him? How about a compromise edit? Thank you for your willingness to discuss. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.178.43.177 ( talk) 13:43, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
The sentence was removed again here. It is clearly a summary of material supported in the content of the article as mentioned in the edit summary when it was added here. Rationale for support has been given in this discussion. Additional rationale is in WP:LEAD, "summary of its most important aspects", "The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview. It should define the topic, establish context,...summarize the most important points", "emphasis given to material in the lead should roughly reflect its importance to the topic". Consensus is demonstrated by this, this, this and this as well as the above discussion. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 19:28, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
WP:ASF is clear that we should simply state that his claims are incorrect. We don't need to go into more detail about opinions. His statements about the age of the Earth are simply incorrect. That's all there is to say. jps ( talk) 20:37, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
There may be a more artful way to do it. "His beliefs about the Age of the Earth were shown to be incorrect more than one hundred years ago." would be one way of doing it. There are others. Basically we should not attribute the fact of the age of the Earth to the opinions of scientists. It is simply the age it is -- approx. 4.5 billion years old (give or take a few hundred million years). jps ( talk) 21:03, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
If I argue that the universe has always existed, is that the same or different than arguing that the universe is only a few thousand years old? My point is that you can say that scientists don't believe that the universe never had a beginning (or will have an end), but that's all you can say. In my lifetime, the universe has gotten about 3 billion years older. Have we now arrived at Truth, or will the universe continue to age as needed?-- John Foxe ( talk) 21:38, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps wording the sentence "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" as "His claims about the young age of the earth have been dismissed by the mainstream scientific community" would suffice for the mainstream point of view as well as all points of view. Unless Wikipedia prefers the mainstream point of view as opposed to the neutral point of view, I think this wording is an acceptable choice. — The Sackinator ( talk) 22:13, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Sorry, folks. If you cannot understand that the Age of the Earth is a fact and not an opinion, then you should not be editing Wikipedia. See WP:COMPETENCE. It's very basic. jps ( talk) 22:17, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
None of the links you provided show that there is any question about the age of the Earth. The neutral point of view is expounded upon
here. We simply state the fact that the age of the Earth is not what Ken Hamm says it is and leave it at that. It is simply a fact that he is incorrect.
jps (
talk) 6:36 pm, Today (UTC−4)
"His claims about the young age of the Earth are incorrect." works because it is in accord with
WP:ASSERT. Your proposed wording is not.
jps (
talk) 22:38, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Agree with jps. Fringe does not negate fact. Adequate discussion of policy above. - - MrBill3 ( talk) 22:54, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
———————— Lampstand49-These are my comments for consideration toward consensus. Please quit censoring (hiding) my comments. Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:26, 19 March 2014 (UTC) These four sources for the opening statement are arbitrary and require review. With the exception of Brett Grainger's book, these sources simply state opinions and not poll numbers. Here are the suspect sources that are simply one-sided. When the discussion becomes one-sided, it is merely propaganda. As it stands right now, the statement "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" is simply one-sided propaganda with no balance. I think we need to reveal where the ultimate authority for that statement resides. Here are the sources used to hand down a one-sided verdict using the old idiom as Judge, jury and executioner. : 4. ^ a b Greg Neyman. Ham Can't Tell the Simple Truth!. Answers in Creation. 12 Sept. 2005 5. ^ Wilensky-Lanford, Brook (2011). Paradise Lust: Searching for the Garden of Eden. Grove Press. pp. 215–. ISBN 9780802119803. Retrieved 18 March 2014. 6. ^ Flank, Lenny (2007-01-01). Deception by Design: The Intelligent Design Movement in America. Red and Black Publishers. pp. 73–. ISBN 9780979181306. Retrieved 18 March 2014. 7. ^ Grainger, Brett (2009-05-26). In the World but Not of It: One Family's Militant Faith and the History of Fundamentalism in America. Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 147–. ISBN 9780802718648. Retrieved 18 March 2014. Here is the definition for arbitrary. 1. subject to individual will or judgment without restriction; contingent solely upon one's discretion: an arbitrary decision. - "Source: dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/arbitrary" We need to restore balance to the opening statement at a minimum. You cannot have an article that starts with a one-sided bit of propaganda. At the very least, many who read the first paragraph will simply dismiss it immediately for its obvious bias. We need to have an immediate review of these one-sided old earth sources. What do these four sources have to do with virtually all members of the scientific community? These sources are simply irrelevant with the exception of Brett Grainger's use of gallup poll data. Greg Neyman is giving his opinion from an old earth viewpoint about The Global Flood. This has nothing to do with a consensus or poll of those in the scientific community. Brook Wilensky-Lanford is simply writes some of his thoughts on the history of the young earth creation movement in the context of his search for The Garden of Eden. This has nothing to do with a poll or percentage of scientist who disapprove of young earth creation. This source is useless. Lenny Flank is simply writing his opinion on the Intelligent Design Movement. Again, this has nothing to do with a percentage of scientist who support "young earth creation" verses those who support "old earth views". Brett Grainger's book was the only book that I found any real data at the beginning which in fact does not support the opening statement of this article. Here is the data from Brett Grainger's book on page 141. He uses data from a 2004 gallup poll. 45 percent of Americans believe in a literal Genesis. 38 percent of Americans believe God somehow guided evolution. 13 percent of Americans held a purely naturalist view. As you can see, these four sources do not give evidence for what is concluded in the opening statement of this article. Nowhere in these sources did I find "virtually all members of the scientific community" agreeing on anything concluded in that opening statement. In fact the data from Brett Grainger's book would suggest that there are a great number of scientists who believe in a literal Genesis. That would be the most obvious conclusion from the poll data. After all, in 2004, 45 percent of Americans believed in a literal Genesis according to Brett Grainger's book which is one of your sources. Therefore, this article is at risk of being labeled as simply propaganda. The opening statement of this article needs serious scrutiny, and needs to be reviewed. I think this could be considered slanderous, a smear campaign, or perhaps a dubious claim at best. Here is the definition for slander. 2. a malicious, false, and defamatory statement or report: a slander against his good name. "Source: dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/slander" The opening statement simply falsely states its conclusion "virtually all members of the scientific community" without any evidence to support it. What are the poll numbers in actuality? Currently, this is an article with an opening statement that has false conclusions with arbitrary sources. Smear Campaign definition - 1. A plan to discredit a public figure by making false or dubious accusations. "Source: Oxford Dictionaries http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/smear-campaign" Dubious definition - 2 Not to be relied upon; suspect:, "Source: Oxford Dictionaries http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/dubious" This page needs to cease using irrelevant sources. It needs to present facts. Here are the pertinent facts. The latest gallup poll numbers are given in the following article "Source: Gallup Politics, In U.S., 46% Hold Creationist View of Human Origins http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/hold-creationist-view-human-origins.aspx" The gallup poll reveals that 46 percent of College Graduates believe God created humans in present form within last 10,000 years. It also reveals that 25 percent of Postgraduates believe God created humans in present form. Whereas, only 14 percent of College Graduates believe Humans evolved, God had no part in process, and only 29 percent of Postgraduates believe Humans evolved, God had no part in process. Here is the gallup poll data over time. "Source: Gallup, Evolution, Creationism, Intelligent Design http://www.gallup.com/poll/21814/evolution-creationism-intelligent-design.aspx" The Pew Forum has collected data on this subject further showing the false claims of this article as it currently stands as well. "Source: Pew Research, Religion & Public Life Project, Scientists and Belief http://www.pewforum.org/2009/11/05/scientists-and-belief" The Pew Forum has results on who actually believes in God. This is a broad statement about belief in God which makes up a majority of the population. The Pew Forum has also collected similar data on Evolution. "Source: Pew Research, Fact Tank, Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham: Are evolution and religion at odds? http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/02/03/bill-nye-vs-ken-ham-are-evolution-and-religion-at-odds"
Therefore, the false claim of this article "by virtually all members of the scientific community" needs rapid revision according to the data above. The following sentence should be removed quickly. "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" because it is a false assertion. ——————— Lampstand49 ( talk) 10:25, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Lampstand49 ( talk) 10:43, 19 March 2014 (UTC) ——————— Lampstand49
The following sentence should be removed quickly. "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" because it is a false assertion which could be considered slanderous, a smear campaign, or perhaps a dubious claim at best. You may give data from actual polls on the subject, but this page must cease from false claims. I have provided the poll numbers above. Lampstand49 ( talk) 11:20, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Gaba, you need to quit hiding my "well-thought" out talk page comments that other users will be interested in hearing. This violates Wikipedia guidelines. It is a short well-thought out discussion that is relevant to the opening section. Please do not violate Wikipedia guidelines by censoring talk page comments. Lampstand49 ( talk) 12:28, 19 March 2014 (UTC)Gaba, I have been well intentioned from the very start. However, those who have opposing views have chosen to label and collapse my well-thought out text which I had hoped would help reach a consensus. In regards to your supposed "Walloftext", here is what the Wikipedia guidelines read. "Not all long posts are walls of text, some can be nuanced and thoughtful. " - Wikipedia Not too mention, my comments all followed Wikipedia rules and were not very long, not the size of a novel. You should read the guidelines more closely. From the time I posted my comments, several of you immediately labeled and collapsed them. You repeatedly labeled and collapsed my comments. Why? Perhaps, so that they would not be included in reaching a consensus because they do not fit your point of view. What kind of concensus is that which includes only you? By the way, this is why Talk Pages are here? Discussions like these can build friendships. Your friend. Have a great day. Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:53, 19 March 2014 (UTC) |
Issue resolved, let's close this and move on
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We must not claim that this is an opinion. Where it appears, we must WP:ASSERT it plainly without regard for the chatter of those who are offended by such facts for whatever reason. This is not up for debate. jps ( talk) 23:07, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
I don't think StAnselm should be allowed to continue on in this manner. This is very problematic. He is essentially denying basic facts and that is inimical to writing an encyclopedia. I suggest simply ignoring him. Consensus is clearly not on his side.
jps (
talk) 23:46, 18 March 2014 (UTC)
Of course there's no debate here, this isn't
Conservapedia. The age of the Earth is a fact as much as its roundness is. Are there improvements still being made to those values?
Of course. Are there people even today claiming the opposite?
Of course. Should we give even a little amount of credence to these ideas?
Of course not.
StAnselm if you want to have a philosophical debate "about what constitutes a scientific "fact"",
you're in the wrong place. And I have to say
jps has a point, you seem to be completely failing
WP:COMPETENCE here and your behaviour is dangerously close to
WP:STONEWALL.
Please post your proposed version (or your support with this one) so we can work towards a consensus one. Regards. Gaba (talk) 00:00, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Very well, based on the comments and applying WP:ASSERT, here's a second stab at a new version of the statement:
I tried to combine my proposal above with jps's proposal. Thoughts? Gaba (talk) 02:07, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Seeing as there is broad consensus for the statement above (6 to 1) I'm requesting the second proposal above be added to the article. To make it clear, the edit is the sentence:
to replace the current one in the lead:
Regards. Gaba (talk) 15:33, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Gaba, you cannot state as a fact that a young age for the earth "is incorrect". You do not know that from Radiometric Dating, the fact is most geologists should know better. You should remove "is incorrect" stated as a fact. This will just drive people to other information sources. It shows extreme bias in this particular article. Lampstand49 ( talk) 15:52, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
I want each of you to know that I love you guys regardless of the outcome here. I know we have very different points of view, but most importantly I want you to know that I love you guys. Seriously. Lampstand49 ( talk) 15:57, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
Who was disruptive? Lampstand49 ( talk) 16:16, 19 March 2014 (UTC) |
Violation of WP:TPG |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
——————— Lampstand49 I have an interest in geology because my father was head of The Petroleum Engineering Department at The University of Tulsa. He later became one of the lead Petroleum Consultants at OGCI in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He formed his own Oil and Gas consulting company as well before he passed away. He taught at Imperial College in London, and he also consulted for most of the major oil companies. I have a great interest in geology. Did you know that you cannot confirm the age of the earth from Radiometric Dating? I will ask anyone here to give me the slightest evidence that any of these rock layers are old. That is my challenge to you. When you post your evidence, you should expect my repsonse. Then, we can investigate if a Young Age of the Earth has been debunked as has been stated in this article. A Young Age of the Earth is exactly what we would expect given that The Bible is true. Radiometric Dating simply analyzes decay rates of isotopes. It does not return dates. Any geologist knows this. Every informed geologist also knows that Radiometric Dating has assumptions and faults. Radiometric dating is based on assumptions that are unprovable and plagued with problems. Rocks may inherit isotopes from their sources, and / or they could be contaminated when moving through other rocks to their current resting location. It is possible that inflowing water may have mixed parent or daughter isotopes into the rocks. Radioactive decay rates may have changed or not have been constant. New research does indicates that radioactive elements have decayed at much faster speeds in the past 6,000 years. Since these dating techniques are based on faulty assumptions and lead to unreliable results. For example, they have found "Supposed" 45 thousand yr old fossil wood inside "supposed" 45 million yr old basalt. Obviously, the dates are incorrect. Therefore, these radioactive dates of "Supposed" old ages should not be trusted, not only for these reasons, but they contradict what is written in God's Word for God is the Creator and Eyewitness of the original Creation Events. When you trust in God and you understand some basic science, you can see how these faulty assumptions lead to incorrect dates. The age of the earth is not settled. All of the following men believed in a literal Genesis: Galileo Galilei (Improved the telescope, supported Copernicanism and the father of modern physics), Johann Kepler (third principle of planetary motion, contributed to the field of optics,analyzed the workings of the human eye,the volume of solid bodies), John Wilkins(founder of The Royal Society), Walter Charleton(President of the Royal College of Physicians), Blaise Pascal(Theory of probability, Hydrostatics, Barometer and conic sections), Sir William Petty(Statistician and scientiest), Robert Boyle(Chemistry and Gas Dynamics), John Ray(Natural Histoy), Isaac Barrow(developer of infinitesimal calculus), Nicolas Steno(Stratigraphy), Thomas Burnet(Geologist), Increase Mather(President of Harvard University 1692-1701), Nehemiah Grew(Physiologist and pioneer of dactyloscopy), Sir Isaac Newton(Calculus, Dynamics, Gravitation Law, Reflecting Telescope, Spectrum of Light, Three laws of motion, Theory of universal gravitation, Wrote extensively on The Bible),Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz( Law of Continuity and Transcendental Law of Homogeneity, infinitesimal calculus) and John Flamsteed(The first Astronomer Royal). Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:04, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:04, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
For those intterested, I've opened a thread regarding Lampstand49's disruptive use of the article's talk page edit warring to un-collapse his walls of text here: Lampstand49 reported by User:Gaba. Regards. Gaba (talk) 14:22, 19 March 2014 (UTC) Gaba, I have been well intentioned from the very start. However, those who have opposing views have chosen to label and collapse my well-thought out text which I had hoped would help reach a consensus. In regards to your supposed "Walloftext", here is what the Wikipedia guidelines read. "Not all long posts are walls of text, some can be nuanced and thoughtful. " - Wikipedia Not too mention, my comments all followed Wikipedia rules and were not very long, not the size of a novel. You should read the guidelines more closely. From the time I posted my comments, several of you immediately labeled and collapsed them. You repeatedly labeled and collapsed my comments. Why? Perhaps, so that they would not be included in reaching a consensus because they do not fit your point of view. What kind of concensus is that which includes only you? Lampstand49 ( talk) 14:41, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
My comments were thoughtful with poll numbers and information about past scientists which could really help the balance of the article. I appropriately put my comments on the Talk Page in a thoughtful manner. I am here to help the group reach a more informed consensus so that the article is balanced. As it currently stands, the article has false information. I never said anyone had to use the poll information that I have provided which show the current article to be false. With that said, I was censored by a couple of people in this group who were disruptive because they were collapsing all of my comments. Lampstand49 ( talk) 15:26, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
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Please add as the final sentence of the final paragraph in the "Career" section:
References
-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:34, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
|newspaper=The Guardian
|location=London
I would also amend |last=Zack Kopplin
to |first=Zack
|last=Kopplin
I would also avoid a generic name for the ref (i.e. name="Guardian"
) because that has a high potential for duplication; instead I would use a more specific name like name="Guardian20140204"
or just omit it entirely. --
Redrose64 (
talk) 20:02, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
|answered=no
) and I'll do it. I unwatched this page because of the disagreements below. --
Redrose64 (
talk) 10:31, 24 March 2014 (UTC)![]() | This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
71.178.194.11 ( talk) 18:51, 21 March 2014 (UTC) The sentence "His claim about the young age of the Earth, based on his interpretation of the Bible, is incorrect and dismissed as such by the scientific community" is bias towards evolutionist and untrue.
{{
edit protected}}
template. --
Redrose64 (
talk) 22:28, 21 March 2014 (UTC)Rehash of almost all of the discussions above
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The current wording "His claim about the young age of the Earth, based on his interpretation of the Bible, is incorrect" seems rather unencyclopedic. Elsewhere on Wikipedia we have wording like:
I would suggest that the previous wording "His claims about the young age of the earth have been condemned by virtually all members of the scientific community" is better than what we have now. -- 101.117.77.33 ( talk) 00:50, 22 March 2014 (UTC) |