Travis Weis

Philosophy Final Essay

Bill Nye vs Ken Ham

In 2014 there was a relatively famous debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham on the topic

of “is creationism of viable model of origins in today’s modern scientific era. As most of us

remember Bill Nye is the main character in the show Bill Nye the science guy but he is also the

CEO of the world’s largest space interest group, a science educator with multiple awards, a

television presenter, mechanical engineer, and science advocate. In this debate, Bill Nyes

argument is very clear in his opening statement he says “And on CSI, there is no distinction

made between historical science and observational science. These are constructs unique to Mr.

Ham. We don't normally have these anywhere in the world except here. Natural laws that applied

in the past apply now; that's why there are natural laws, that's why we embrace them. That's how

we made all these discoveries that enabled this marvelous technology.” Meaning that when Bill

Nye would answer this debate question he would say that creationism is not viable today. He

uses the CSI example because he is saying that science is science and we should not make

separations of sciences because it makes it so that we cant move forward or progress scientific

experiments. This is because how can you find new laws of nature if it not only applies to nature

but also the underlying concepts of god, he is saying that creationism is outdated because it is a

closed-minded view on the origins of our world.

Ken Ham, on the other hand, is the CEO and founder of Answers to Genesis and the

creation museum (where the debate was held). In answering this question Ham would say that

scientist can hold any view on the origin that they want to because the makes the distinction
between historical vs experimental sciences. He says “The creationism debate is really a conflict

between two philosophical worldviews based on two different accounts of origins or historical

science beliefs.” Meaning that he sees that there is a clear distinction between historical sciences

and experiment sciences and that scientists can do experimental science but believe any theory of

our origins as they see fit. Because of this, he says “Public school textbooks are using the same

word science for observational science and historical science.” and “They are imposing the

religion of naturalism on generations of students.” These quotes represent Ham’s view on what is

wrong with teaching science in today’s schools and how our society teaches historical and

experimental science as the same thing even though he considers it as a religion. He says that it

is dangerous to teach evolution and historical science as fact because it doesn’t allow for

free-thinking in students and the new generation.

Both of these arguments are valid arguments and do have reasons for believing and

understanding both of them. For instance, Ken Ham has a very good argument when explaining

the differences in historical vs observational science. He says that he and Bill would see the same

evidence or data but just interpret it as different things. I believe that this makes a lot of sense

because people should be allowed to think differently and should be entitled to there own

opinions. That is what allows for a diversity of ideas and thinking which actually helps science.

His argument is that because the debate is not being taught in schools it limits critical thinking in

students and limits their freedom to think however they want about the origins of the earth which

again is a very valid and real argument. However, the problem with Ham’s argument is I found

that when he talks about how the bible making predictions about our future and we can use

scientific evidence to see these predictions I found to be incorrect. For instance, the bible talks
about Noah’s Ark and the great flood. Ham connected this to the discoloration in the rocks in the

grand canyon and said it is evidence for this flood. I would say that you could connect anything

to anything if you use alot of Adhoc and staying in one concept is closed-minded and leads to

incorrect theories and concepts. What I mean by this is you can’t change the big concepts of the

bible, sure you can change add notes or your own interpretations, yet once you start to change

the big concepts of the bible it stops becoming Christianity and turns into something different

which defeats the point of creationism. However, science allows for more openmindedness of

theories because it can change to the theory that has more evidence or is just better for the

progression of science. As Thomas Kuhn says in his writing The Structure of Scientific

Revolutions “which an older paradigm is replaced in whole or in part by an incompatible new

one. There is more to be said, however, and an essential part of it can be introduced by asking

one further question. Why should a change of paradigm be called a revolution?” Meaning that in

science we accept when one theory is better than another because it has either more substantial

evidence. That’s the biggest problem in believing in creationism, science is more real because it

can change with what is found, it changes based on the more that we know. You can use as many

ad hocs as you need in order to keep the theory of creationism alive but it will get to a point

where it won’t make sense anymore and evidence just explains something else better.

Bill Nye has a good argument in describing why creationism is not accurate or realistic

because of the different things that happen in genesis. For instance, he talks about the logistics

about Noahs Ark and what happens to wood when it is built that big and how it bends and

realistically you cant create a ship that big out of wood. Or how when they drilled in the antarctic

there were 680,000 layers of ice and every layer or ice was a winter-summer cycle so how could
that fit into the earth is only 6000 years old. Bill Nye does a very good job of pointing out that if

he got 2 of every animal how would the animals disperse out into the world and not show

evidence of movement from fossils. However, Nye doesn’t do a good job at some aspects of his

argument, I say this because he won’t even acknowledge the differences between historical and

observational sciences. The reason I say this is because there are significant differences between

these two sciences. He should have gone with a Carol Cleland model when addressing historical

vs experimental sciences. She says “Traces, such as the three-degree background radiation,

provide evidence for historical hypotheses, just as successful predictions provide evidence for

the generalizations tested in experimental science.” In this quote, Cleland talks about the

different sciences and how they differ but then brings it back to why they both use logical proof

and are viable sciences. Cleland’s argument would be better for Bill Nye in this instance because

when Bill says that all science is the same it seems like he doesn’t know the difference between

the two sciences which makes it look like he is not even looking at the other side of the

argument, this way he looks more credible as a debater.

In conclusion, I believe that Bill Nye had a stronger argument because of the different

arguments he was presenting. To be as completely transparent I was expecting Bill Nye to blow

this debate out of the water. Nonetheless, I was pleasantly surprised that it was actually a good

debate that made me think a lot about this topic. I will say Ham did explain his argument of why

we should teach about this debate so children can think critically about where we came from. Yet

Bill’s arguments about how creationism is unreasonable in today’s scientific understanding of

how our world works just make more sense. In my opinion, I think that creationism is just to
closeminded to an origin story, it is not specific enough and when there is evidence that proves

this wrong it is mostly meet with ad hocs which I don’t find valid for a theory or an argument.

Works Cited

Browning, Bill. “Transcript of Ken Ham vs Bill Nye Debate.” ​Rocky Mountain Creation
Fellowship,​ ​http://www.youngearth.org/index.php/archives/rmcf-articles/item/21-transcript-of-ke
n-ham-vs-bill-nye-debate​.

“Bill Nye.” ​The Planetary Society Blog​, ​https://www.planetary.org/about/staff/bill-nye.html​.

Cleland, Carol E. “Historical Science, Experimental Science, and the Scientific Method.” Nov.
2001, pp. 987–990.

Kuhn, T., 1970, The structure of scientific revolutions: Chicago, Illinois, University
of Chicago Press, 210 p.

YouTube,​ YouTube, ​https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6kgvhG3AkI&t=549s​.