Creationist Ken Ham vs. Bill “the Science Guy” Nye
Ham and Nye showed how debates about the undebatable can be valuable. But it depends on the integrity and honesty of the debaters.
On June 14, 2023, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared on The Joe Rogan Experience, the most popular podcast in the world. For three hours, Rogan and RFK Jr. proffered false claims about vaccines. Later, RFK Jr. said he would be happy to debate any scientist. Should scientists take him up on his offer? Or, said another way, should scientists debate facts that aren’t debatable?
Scientists can reasonably debate the undebatable. But it depends on the sincerity and integrity of the debater. Sometimes much is learned in these debates. For example:
On February 5, 2014, Bill Nye, a mechanical engineer and science educator, debated Ken Ham, the CEO of Answers in Genesis. The debate took place at the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky. Nine hundred people attended, three million viewed it live on the Internet, and ten million have seen it on YouTube.
Ken Ham opened the discussion by claiming that everything that we need to know about the creation of the Earth can be found in Genesis. According to Ham, Charles Darwin was wrong; humankind, and all manner of life on the planet, didn’t evolve from a common ancestor. Rather, God created man and the animals much as we see them today. Nye countered that to deny evolution meant ignoring 250,000 years of fossil records.
Ham then claimed that the earth was only 6,000 years old: “From Adam to Abraham—you’ve got two thousand years; from Abraham to Christ, two thousand years; from Christ to the present, two thousand years. That’s how we reach 6,000 years.” Nye said that carbon dating of rocks showed that Ham was off by about 4.5 billion years. Ham countered that, “The only infallible dating method comes from the only witness who was there: God. And his word is all that is reliable.”
Bill Nye didn’t argue the existence of God. Rather, he offered several interesting facts. Nye said that ice cores in places like the North Pole showed 680,000 layers—meaning that it took at least 680,000 cycles of winter and summer to create them. If Ham was correct that the Earth was only a few thousand years old, then hundreds of winter-summer cycles would have had to have occurred every year.
Nye also countered Ham’s belief in the Great Flood and Noah’s ark. He asked whether eight men without any previous ship building experience could have built an all-wooden boat that was 500-feet long, knowing that no wooden boat that long has ever been built. Further, Noah’s Ark contained 14,000 animals which, paired male and female, represented 7,000 different species. Given that there are 16 million different species of animals on the Earth today, this would mean that 11 new species would have had to have been created every day, when in fact species are being eliminated, not created. Ham countered that Nye “can’t say that Noah couldn’t build the Ark because you never met Noah.”
Ken Ham was sincere in his belief. He never attacked Bill Nye or questioned his motives. He didn’t say that Bill Nye was a blasphemer or that he was condemned to suffer the tortures of hell. He also didn’t lie. Ken Ham believed that the Bible was the word of God—immutable and absolute. Anyone watching that debate learned a lot about how to respectfully counter creationists.
A debate with RFK Jr. about the safety of vaccines, on the other hand, would be worthless. RFK Jr. knowingly lies about scientific facts. And he personally attacks those who disagree with him, claiming that they’re Big Pharma shills or government hacks. Ken Ham believed what he was saying. RFK Jr. is a lawyer who is paid by the anti-vaccine organization, Children’s Health Defense, to advocate for a particular position, which he does by knowingly misrepresenting facts. Two recent events make this point.
On June 22, 2023, Joan Walsh published a mea culpa in The Nation. “I was the Salon editor in partnership with Rolling Stone, who 18 years ago published [RFK Jr.’s] mendacious, error-ridden piece on how thimerosal in childhood vaccines supposedly led to a rise in autism, and how public health officials covered it up…Now, Kennedy insists, as The New York Times paraphrases him, that ‘Salon caved to pressure from government regulators and the pharmaceutical industry.’…That’s just another lie. We caved to pressure from the incontrovertible truth and our journalistic consciences.”
Walsh then described a CDC meeting on vaccine safety at a conference center outside Atlanta, where claims of a link between thimerosol and autism were discussed. Anyone reading that transcript would conclude that this group of scientists, public health representatives, and government officials were weighing the strengths and weaknesses of available data. Not RFK Jr. “Where the transcript diverged from the story he wanted to tell,” wrote Walsh, “he simply cut and pasted until things came out right. He did that to make the assembled medical experts look like they were pulling off an enormous hoax, at times editing their statements to sound like the very opposite of what they believed.”
Also on June 22, 2023, Jake Tapper, a correspondent for CNN, appeared on a podcast. “I did a story about the piece that [RFK Jr.] did for Rolling Stone…I called him and told him we were going to hold it a day and do some more due diligence on his claims…It ran on World News Tonight with Peter Jennings the next night…In [RFK Jr.s’] retelling of the story, he and I were working closely for three weeks on a terrific documentary about his discovery, and corporate America killed it…None of that was true.” Tapper was asked whether correspondents on CNN, much as they had done with Donald Trump, Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, and Chris Christie, were planning to host a town hall with RFK Jr. “No,” said Tapper. “He’s so dishonest!”
You can’t debate someone who knowingly manipulates or flat out lies about the facts to advance their claims. Although Ken Ham was wrong about the earth’s creation, he was sincere in his beliefs. He didn’t misquote the Bible or lie about its contents or attack Bill Nye. Given his constant misrepresentation and manipulation of the evidence, you can’t say the same thing about Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
I am going to express disappointment with the way you are steering this "conversation" at this point. Having watched RFK Jr of late, it is clear he is not the dishonest, malicious individual that you are portraying him to be, nor is he particularly ignorant of many of the more technical issues surrounding the development and licensure of vaccines. To many that have actually listened to him, even those of us that are well versed in the scientific method, these assertions ring hollow.
Is he right about everything? Of course not, no one is. Does he represent an increasing number of Americans that have questions, and that want to see engagement by the establishment, rather than just being at the receiving end of lectures from "the experts"? Most definitely.
I presume the reason you got into your profession was to find ways to make people healthier through the practice of medicine, and to proactively ward off disease through vaccines. Many of us were concerned during the COVID-19 pandemic that the ensuing mass vaccination policies degraded from this more lofty purpose, transitioning into the realm of profit and control, and that this adversely impacted traditional medical care, particularly including trust in vaccines. This is the case among a (still) growing percentage of the populace.
As someone that wants to see the situation remedied, watching the establishment digging into their safe spaces and taking pot shots at RFK Jr is not a good look. Perhaps you resent him for what he has said and done in the past, which you believe has resulted in undeserved anger being directed at yourself and your peers, and that is understandable. Likewise, he has been ostracized for years, censored far more than most, so it would not be surprising if he feels a certain way was well. But at least he is willing to engage the other side, often in a one on many format, to present his arguments and concerns. And people are listening.
My suggestion is you do the same. You are probably the best person to do this with your combination of gravitas and ability to clearly communicate the issues. Doing the podcast with Vincent Racaniello is fine, but you need to also transcend beyond the echo chamber if you want your message heard by the skeptics, and many others that have always followed establishment guidance, but that are finding RFK Jr more than a simple conspiracy theorist.
Nothing productive would come from a debate with RFK Jr. Glad Jake Tapper rejected holding a town hall for RFK Jr.
George Lakoff -
"Of course, there are times when it is legitimate and necessary to debate and disagree. Some issues are matters of opinion or preference rather than fact. But when confronted by someone who does not regard facts as relevant, you’re better off skipping the debate and saving your energy for a more productive conversation.
As a general rule: Don't take the debate bait! Engaging someone with zero credibility or validity only helps them to gain status and spread lies. By trying to negate their false ideas, you'll end up activating them. Remember: They win by making the difference between lies and truth seem like a matter of opinion."