Creationism: good-bye reason, here comes the stupid (by anon)

To disagree or not to disagree? Either way, shut up.

There's something that's been bugging me lately. Whenever there is some philosophical discussion a religious person tends to attack science or say it's "bullshit." Being a sciencey person, I base my beliefs on the scientific method and that statement just sparks a flare to the brush that is my intolerance for blatant deadlocked ignorance.

In our group of friends, we were having a conversation the other day. Just having a couple brews with the bros, one very good friend, who was raised by a baptist pastor his whole life, observed that, "radio carbon dating is total bullshit with zero reliability. It's not even science." I tried to explain that carbon dating itself only gives a wide range of the age of material which is why when the test is performed it includes radio xenon dating, phosphorous dating, nitrogen dating, basically a huge variety of elements until it can be narrowed down to a reasonable time range based on the radio isotopes which work much the same way a radio active clock works with elements decaying at a very constant consistent manner. But before I could get past 'carbon dating is' I was cut off with my friend saying that his dad showed videos of this guy who travels around to highschools to have afterschool debates with teachers who embrace evolution. I've seen one of these videos with my buddy a long time ago and needless to say, the guy is good at arguing. But he doesn't debate with our professors or anyone with a PHD. Frankly, in the one I saw the teacher was blown out of the water. But it IS a highschool teacher. Educated, but this one in particular was not charismatic and couldn't handle being bull rushed by a hot blooded southern baptist with the rage of God that children are being taught nonsense and blasphemy.

Here's my beef. If you're a firm believer that the universe is 6,000 years and 6 days old and you find yourself in an argument, especially with someone who knows what they're talking about, about evolution or the sort, then you need to say "My strength in faith is more powerful than my faith in science" and end it there. Otherwise you'll get in a circular argument trying to justify your countless hours of religious practice and your sciency antagonator, no matter how slow and calm he speaks, will make so much sense that it offends you.

It's not impossible for both religion and science to be trusted. You can combine, intertwine, and pick and choose your accumulated beliefs from each side but naturally if you take the bible literally and not as a fiction story you find a few irregularities between what it says and what someone with a doctorate who studied the earth for 50 years will say. It’s probable to disagree with people who have been indoctrinated with malice aforethought that they will literally repudiate justification that is right in front of them. If you see me holding a hundred dollar bill in front of a mans face and he says it's not there, what do you think? You think he's blind or crazy? He might already be a block away running with it or he's the world's most intelligent philosopher about to drop a bomb and mind fuck you silly. Or you just think he's an idiot. And this is what creationists have been doing; they have been literally denying justification that is right in front of them, aren’t they? These people are so adamant about holding these so-simply-answered preconceptions that they have altered the clarification of the word evidence. Creationists have a garland of theories with a raise of what they call contribution regarding those theories, yet they can't see that their arguments don’t rest on proof or rationality they just have a really great publicist.

“To disagree with a male who has renounced his reason is like giving disinfectant to the dead.”  ~Thomas Paine