Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Wincing and Smiling
An interview with Ronald Numbers, a former Seventh-day Adventist and author of The Creationists, the definitive history of creationism, is the subject of an interview by Steve Paulson in Salon.
"I was never exposed to anything other than what we now call "young earth creationism," says Numbers in the interview. "Creation science came out of Seventh-day Adventism. My father was a believer, all my teachers were believers, all my friends believed in that. I can remember as a college student -- I majored in math and physics -- there was a visiting professor from the University of Chicago lecturing on carbon-14 dating, and he was talking about scores of thousands of years. And my friends and I just looked at each other, wincing and smiling, saying he just didn't know the truth."
Then Numbers goes on to relate the events that led him to question creation science and embrace real science -- at the cost of his relationship with his father, an Adventist minister. A fascinating story, along the way you'll learn how creation science was born. Well worth reading.
"I was never exposed to anything other than what we now call "young earth creationism," says Numbers in the interview. "Creation science came out of Seventh-day Adventism. My father was a believer, all my teachers were believers, all my friends believed in that. I can remember as a college student -- I majored in math and physics -- there was a visiting professor from the University of Chicago lecturing on carbon-14 dating, and he was talking about scores of thousands of years. And my friends and I just looked at each other, wincing and smiling, saying he just didn't know the truth."
Then Numbers goes on to relate the events that led him to question creation science and embrace real science -- at the cost of his relationship with his father, an Adventist minister. A fascinating story, along the way you'll learn how creation science was born. Well worth reading.