Creation Museum

The Creation "Museum" is a $27 million amusement park located in Petersburg, Kentucky, USA just a few miles from Cincinnati, near the Kentucky-Indiana-Ohio tripoint, which should tell you all you need to know.MSNBC:High-tech museum brings creationism to life Ken Ham, president of Answers in Genesis (AIG) founded itCreationMuseaum:About and it is devoted to the young earth creationist idea that "The Bible is true from Genesis to Revelation!""Police and Thieves", Murvin/Perry — that is, in complete opposition to the scientific consensus and basic logic.About.com:Geology 
The unaccredited museumList of Accredited Museums, March 2014 American Alliance of Museums (archived from August 1, 2016). See "American Alliance of Museums: Accreditation" for current status. promotes the idea that "the Bible is the history book of the universe". This is somehow supposed to be in line with their idea that "facts don't speak for themselves" and that the Bible contains the "correct" way to interpret any and all evidence available in the physical world. A lot of the things they say are not even found in the Bible itself, and seem to be the product of people trying to think of ways to explain things further to make sense (if they can possibly make sense at all). They seem to be pulling most of it out of their ass, which is probably why it's so full of crap.
The Creation Museum is located very close to the "The Birthplace of American Paleontology" and one of the largest fossil finds in North America.Atheists at the Creation Museum by TheThinkingAtheist (Jun 22, 2013) YouTube. This was done deliberately by AiG.
==Creation Museum "science"==
Lawrence Krauss, director of the Center for Education and Research in Cosmology and Astrophysics at Case Western Reserve University (Ohio), stated publicly that the Creation Museum is both a "fraud" and "hypocritical" because:
Krauss debated AiG president Ken Ham in May 2007 on Fox News Channel's popular program The O’Reilly Factor.Source:Answers in Genesis. This has to be a first: accurate information at AiG!!! 
The Creation Museum shows a heliocentric solar system and a spherical Earth, though the Bible suggests geocentrism and a Flat Earth. Ken Ham is inconsistent as he insists theoretically on Biblical literalism but in practice accepts scientific accounts of the nature of the Earth, the Solar System, and the Universe. Still, these conflict with the Bible.The “Science” in the Creation Museum PZ Myers wrote:
==Dinosaurs==
Dinosaurs (of the non-bird variety) are common in the Creation Museum: after all, the kiddies love 'em, and they are therefore a depressingly effective tool for indoctrination. The Creation Museum contains numerous displays of non-avian dinosaurs coexisting peacefully with humansNYtimes:Adam and Eve in the Land of the Dinosaurs despite the overwhelming evidence that they died out millions of years before the first humans,University of California and in case that discrepancy comes up the place also has an exhibit showing a wrecking ball labeled "MILLIONS OF YEARS" striking the foundation of a church to reinforce the false dilemma that one must believe either all the Bible (except of course those parts the fundamentalists choose to ignore) or none of it at all. The Creation Museum supports the view that all dinosaurs in the Garden of Eden were herbivores,Fish feet:T-Rex are coconuts and when asked why T. rex had six-inch-long serrated teeth the guide will explain that those were for opening coconuts.Science blogs:Pharyngula 
The evidence that the Creation Museum presents for the co-existence of dinosaurs and humans is a verse in the Book of Job mentioning a behemoth,Abnormal Interests whose description creationists claim fits that of a sauropod dinosaur. This has been demonstrated to be false, but they still insist on spreading the falsehood.The truth about behemoth It does not bother them that the same book that talks about the behemoth also talks about dragonsAccuracy in genesis and how the behemoth and the leviathan will fight a mighty battle at the end of the world.The Franz Neumann Project
On the BBC Radio programme Today (May 31st 2007), Ken Ham was interviewed about the Creation Museum. He provided an example of the "scientific evidence" that dinosaurs and humans had at one time lived together — it was a drawing on a cave wall which showed humans hunting what appeared to be dinosaurs.
Apparently, humans in the past:
*were incapable of making stuff up so the cave paintings had to be accurate, and 
*never found fossil dinosaurs and could never have developed painting from what they knew about the fossils.
The Creation Museum was given an authentic allosaur specimen which lived and died during the Jurassic period roughly 150 million years ago died during Noah's flood a few thousand years ago and proved the flood really happened.Creation Museum Fossil Claimed as Proof of Noah’s Flood The allosaur will teach children and adults young earth creationism.Something Big is Almost Here Ironically, the allosaur skeleton contains a clearly visible furcula (wishbone), an anatomical trait that supports the evolutionary link between theropod dinosaurs and birds.
===Blatant errors===
Apart from the obvious, the place makes several mistakes with the models. Example models include a Tyrannosaurus rex dragging its tail on the floor in an upright position that would have broken its spine and an Iguanadon with skin completely different from fossilised imprints. Other mistakes stem from the fact that some models are clearly copied from Stan Winston's dinosaur designs from the Jurassic Park series rather than from actual fossil finds. Examples include a featherless Utahraptor sporting anatomically incorrect pronated forearms (its hands facing forwards instead of towards each other)National Center for Science Education - Anti-Museum overviewGregory S. Paul, Dinosaurs of the Air: The Evolution and Loss of Flight in Dinosaurs and Birds and a baby T. rex with oversized eyes and a short snout like the one in The Lost World. Not content with displaying ignorance of just dinosaurs, there are several incorrect reconstructions of Mesozoic flora, one example is a cycad plant reconstructed as little more than a completely unrelated giant pineapple.
There is some indication that the dinos featured in the Ark Encounter will incorporate more scientifically approved designs, or that at least Ark staff are acknowledging that perhaps the designs from Jurassic Park aren't entirely accurate: Spinosaurus is described in an official blog post as having heavily reduced back legs (reflecting 2014 discoveries),Forgotten Fauna: Spinosaurs, Ark Encounter (Dec 12, 2014) and a video showing the construction of juvenile Tyrannosaurus models shows them with unpronated forearms and elongated skulls, in stark contrast to the broken-wristed, pug-nosed Lost World ripoff in the main "museum".Forming the Second T. rex, YouTube (Jul 31, 2015)
==What the heck is "the Bible"?==
Despite being founded on the principles of biblical literalism, the Museum has a rather odd relationship with text from the Bible, as displayed in the museum, specifically:Creating A Christian Nation? Academic Duo Examines Ken Ham’s Creation Museum In New Book by Liz Hayes (April 2017) Americans United for the Separation of Church and State.
*No complete rendition of Genesis 1 through 11 is present anywhere at the museum — despite these passages being utterly foundational to the Museum (and YEC generally)
*Many (originally complete) quotes from the Bible are presented in fragmented form
*Increasing the selective nature of the presentation, there is an inconsistent use of biblical translations
*Scripture is further convoluted by "creative editing" and a general lack of context
For a Museum that explicitly encourages children to attend (only $16 for a child in 2017 vs. $30 for an adultCreation Museum Tickets), there's an oddly creepy obsession with defending incest. Specifically, the Museum defends incest during the first third of the 6000-year biblical history, but argues that it hasn't been OK in the second third.
As such, the two authors — who had initially expected a place like Ken Ham's Pleasure Paradise the Creation Museum to remain "loyal" to the word of the Bible — soon recognized the deeply absurd nature of the entire installation, reflecting that:
Notably, the idiosyncratic view of the Bible presented at the Creation Museum leads to an almost Jesus-free Christianity as displayed in the Museum. Keeping in mind that it's supposed to be Jesus who even puts the Christ in "Christianity" to begin with.
These deficiencies allow for the Museum to gloss over Biblical contradictions within Genesis, ignores the Documentary hypothesis which posits that there are multiple contradictory literary sources of Genesis, and show the hypocrisy of the Museum by claiming literalness but not actually presenting it.
Though not explicitly stated,Why Don’t Christians Follow All the Old Testament Laws? by Bodie Hodge (May 6, 2013) Answers in Genesis. the Creation Museum is based on a simplified version of a rather narrow division of Christianity, or even of fundamentalism, that of dispensational pre-millennialism. This can be inferred from the exhibit titled "7 C's in God's Eternal Plan" (Creation, Corruption, Catastrophe, Confusion, Christ, Cross, Consummation), which is particular to dispensational pre-millennialism.
===Evolution, slavery, and the Holocaust===
The Museum attempts to paint a Biblical harmony among races, while implying that Darwin's theory of evolution supported slavery and led to the Holocaust. Towards the end of Bible Walkthrough Experience section is a large signboard that state, "According to God's Word… We're All One Race — 'One Blood.'", and quoting the beginning of "God has made of one blood all nations." The Museum's argument on Darwin influencing Hitler is basically a guilt-by-association fallacy (Darwin → eugenics → Hitler) combined with taking a Stephen Jay Gould quote out of context. The argument that evolutionary theory supported racism is also supported in the Museum by misquoting Gould, but nowhere is the Bible quoted regarding slavery. This is because if anything, the Bible supports slavery and even racial segregation. The Museum has rewritten the history of Acts 17:26 by quote-mining the Bible and ignoring the fact that the full text of Acts 17:26 was in fact used by white Biblical literalists to justify racial segregation in both the United StatesPeople of God: Segregation September 21, 2012 Central Seminary.Mississippi Praying: Southern White Evangelicals and the Civil Rights Movement, 1945-1975 by Carolyn Renée Dupont (2013) New York University Press. ISBN 1479823511. and South Africa:The theology of apartheid by Ned Temko (June 12, 1986) The Christian Science Monitor.
===Less literal than thou===
The Creation Museum shows a heliocentric solar system and a spherical Earth though the Bible suggests geocentrism and a flat Earth. Ken Ham is pretty inconsistent, considering the man insists theoretically on Biblical literalism, but practically accepts a select few scientific accounts of the nature of Earth, the solar system, and the Universe — despite these findings conflicting with the nonsensical word of the Bible.The "Science" in the Creation Museum by Hemant Mehta, July 6, 2016, Friendly Atheist Ham must have realized that to accept the ancient cosmology of the Bible would make him a laughingstock, but the consequence of accepting what amounts to biblical semi-literalism is the necessity of cherry picking from the Bible for the Museum, particularly by not quoting the complete Genesis 1-11, specifically the troublesome passages of , , and .
Being more literal than the next preacher to win debates is a time-honored tradition, but for all the failures of the Museum to keep to biblical literalism, it even fails when confronted by other biblical literalists. The Museum does not support geocentrism, and as geocentrist Gerardus Bouw points out in response to Danny Faulkner of Answers in Genesis, geocentrism is a more literal interpretation of the Bible.Geocentrism and Creation by Danny R. Faulkner (August 1, 2001) Answers in Genesis.Geocentricity: The Biblical Cosmology by Gerardus Bouw (1992) Association for Biblical Astronomy. For those keeping score, geocentrist parts of the Bible are: , , , , , , and .
===Spiritual antecendents===
Given that the Museum is not faithful to the Bible despite being founded on Biblical literalism, it should not be surprising that the Museum is also not faithful to its spiritual antecedents in the Biblical Authority room:
*Martin Luther, the founder of Protestantism, is portrayed, not posting to his famous 95 Theses, but rather posting a quote from "a character named Fritz in a nineteenth-century historical novel by Elizabeth Rundle Charles"; at least the novel is about Luther.Chronicles of the Schönberg-Cotta Family, By Two of Themselves by Elizabeth Rundle Charles (1868) Dodd, Mead.
*The Scofield Reference Bible, the most important document in dispensationalism and biblical inerrancy, is not accurately represented. In the display of Scofield's Bible showing , the explanatory notes have been partly-excised and replaced.
==Science, as it appears==
The Creation Museum presents a superficially fair presentation of YEC vs. evolution, presenting them side-by-side in many parts of the museum. The Museum, like Ham's debate with Bill Nye, uses a false dichotomy of "observational" (or "operational") versus "historical" science. AIG defines it as "Operational science uses observable, repeatable experiments to try to discover truth."What Is Science? Answers In Genesis 
This dichotomy does not exist in actual science, but even ignoring this fallacy, the Museum's "observational" science is problematic. Unlike actual natural history museums, the Creation Museum consists almost entirely of synthetic objects.Genesis In Hyperreality: Legitimizing Disingenuous Controversy At The Creation Museum by Case Ryan Kelly & Kristen E. Hoerl (2012) Argumentation and Advocacy 48:123-141. So, the beginning of the analysis, the evidence, is mostly not real.
The analysis that is presented consists of large amounts of scientific facts, many not germane to an argument for or against YEC (e.g. the sizes of celestial bodies). At least one presented fact, that the M4 globular cluster is "40 million billion" miles away, would cause a curious person some doubt about the validity of YEC. Conveniently for the Museum, they presented the distance in miles rather than the standard astronomical unit of light years, which is 7200. This means to a scientist, that the light traveling from M4 has taken 1200 years longer to reach the Earth than YEC's proposed length of existence of the Universe of 6000 years. This is known as the starlight problem, which YEC proponents have tried various unscientific tricks to explain away. Ken Ham claims to "love science" but does not want to bother your little head with this problem.
Despite claiming that "observational" science is verifiable but historical science is not, the Museum relies heavily on historical models in the Flood Geology room to get its point across on the flood geology aspect of YEC (15 of 38 placards in the room). Displays in the room reference events in the past that occurred in prehistoric times (e.g., floods and volcanic eruptions), which by Ham's own definition of observational science would not meet his criteria.
Another logical fallacy is evident in the Flood Geology room. The fallacy comes from the Museum's reliance on presuppositionalism; a reliance is also evident in Ham's rewriting of the scientific method to fit his needs:
Presuppositionalism has led to the bastardization of the scientific method, and in turn has led to conscious confirmation bias in the Flood Geology room. For example, the Flood Geology room makes assumptions about post-Flood sediment deposition and crustal folding just because it is YEC, not because of evidence or "observational" science.
The Museum's arguments for YEC also rely on informal fallacies: the argument from beauty, the argument from design, and the appeal to ancient wisdom (i.e. the Bible says so). These are particularly evident in The Stargazer's Planetarium and The Wonders of Creation Room. So, even by the standards of "observational" science, the Creation Museum does not make anything close to a convincing case for YEC.
A basic problem with the Museum in rejecting "historical" science is that it is unable to unequivocally make claims about the past in support of YEC, therefore forcing a false dilemma: even if the Earth is not ~4 billion years old, that does not mean that the only other choice is YEC. Even just within the realm of creationism, there are many competing views.
==Creation Museum conspecifics==
The Creation Museum is just the latest microevolutionary development in the creation museum kind. While no one has ever observed one creation museum kind giving birth to another creation museum kind, there is plenty of variation within the kind (micro only, of course). The closest extant relative of Ken Ham's creation is the Creation & Earth History MuseumCreation & Earth History Museum (formerly called the Museum of CreationCreation and Earth History Museum Creation Wiki. and Earth History), endemic to California, and created by the Institute for Creation Research.
The Mount St Helens Creation Center (previously the 7 Wonders Creation Museum)Mount St Helens Creation Center occupies a completely different ecological niche. Located as a missionary somewhere near Mt. St. Helens this spacious double-wide trailerAbout 7 Wonders Northwest Creation Network. offers guided tours of the monument to Creation by a loving God that all volcanoes represent, but particularly this one. For a mere $10 you can send your kids to a summer camp where they can learn all about how Noah's Ark dealt with lava.
Speaking of double-wide trailers, Patriot Bible University alumnus and federal prisoner ex-con Kent Hovind has been offering children of all ages an adventure of a lifetime at Dinosaur Adventure Land.Dinosaur Adventure Land (archived from January 24, 2007) This Florida landmark has fallen upon tough times; it seems to have been built without a permit. But it is still up and running, and for your tax deductible donation gift of $7 all the wonders of Dr. Dino can be yours.
While Ken Ham is getting all the big press, another major "creation museum" opened in 2008. Big Valley Creation Science MuseumBig Valley Creation Science Museum up in Canada offers all the wonders one comes to expect from a converted garage and the expert consultancy of Ian Juby.
As can be seen, there is a wide variety of trailers, garages, backyards, and abandoned warehouses vying for the money of Creation Science devotees. The question is whether Ken Ham's fully animated pumpkin-eating T. rex will be enough to overcome his competitors?
==Attendance==
By August 1st 2008, a little more than 500 days after opening, the Creation Museum announced it had admitted 500,000 visitors.500,000th Visitor at the Creation Museum August 1, 2008, Answers in Genesis (archived from August 16, 2008). In the same amount of time, Disneyland had almost 21 million (21,000,000) visitors, although this is in almost no way relevant.Disney Themepark Attendance – The Numbers Game by John Frost, March 14, 2008, The Disney Blog. One month away from its third anniversary, the Creation Museum had its 1,000,000th guest."Millionth Guest Visits Creation Museum" April 26th, 2010, Answers in Genesis In response, President and Co-Founder Ken Ham, stated, "We are excited to welcome our one millionth guest today, and we are grateful that God continues to bless this ministry with such strong attendance in a challenging economy." 
A never ending steadily reducing stream of True Believers have been attending the theme park. Attendance fell steadily over its first four years of operation and dropped by 10% in 2012.Stern, Mark Joseph. "Darwin, dinosaurs and the devil." watoday.co.au, February 13, 2013.Creation Museum Attendance Drops for Fourth Straight Year by James McNair, November 7, 2012, Cincinnati CityBeat As of 2013 the Creation Museum was in financial trouble.Kentucky’s ‘Creation Museum’ in Financial Trouble Due to Declining Attendance (VIDEO) by DeadState, June 25, 2013, DeadState Still, there are plans to tempt visitors back by building extensions with even more silly junk religiously inspired "education material."After Three Years Creation Museum Is Evolving (But Not In That Way) by Dennis O'Connor, September 3, 2010, HuffPost Many attendees are public school kids on school trips:
The Freedom From Religion Foundation warned school districts that school trips to the Creation Museum or to Ark Encounter are illegal due to separation of church and state, but it is feared not all will heed the warning.Atheist Group Warns 1,000+ Public School Districts: Don’t Plan Field Trips to Ark Encounter by Hemant Mehta, July 8th, 2016, Friendly Atheist
==Gallery==
File:Entrance P4280288.jpg|Abandon all reason, ye who enter here.
File:AIG museum.jpg|The entrance
File:Adam P4280253.jpg|Penguin in the Garden of Eden
File:Creation Museum, Kentucky-3.jpg|I bet you didn't know that Eve wore clothing even before The Fall.
File:Creation Museum children with dinosaur.jpg|Children coexisting with dinosaurs
File:Dinosaur P4280281.jpg|No, red blood cells were not found in a T. rex fossil.Controversial T. Rex Soft Tissue Find Finally Explained by Stephanie Pappas (November 26, 2013 07:01pm ET) Live Science.
File:Noah P4280268.jpg|The shape of things to come.
File:Creation Museum St George dragon display.jpg|I bet you also didn't know that was in the Bible.
File:15 23 1110 creation museum.jpg|The world was not safe back in the days of smiting either.
==See also==
*Bill Nye debates Ken Ham — a debate conducted at the Creation Museum in 2014
*Creation Evidence Museum — an even more bizarre example
*Dinosaur Adventure Land — Need we say more?
*Hell House — The "Culture in Crisis" room has been described as being similar to a Hell House.
*Holy Land Experience — A TBN owned theme park in Orlando.
*The incontrovertible evidence of common descent
*Young Earth Creationism
==External links/blogsnark==
The following are various reports on the Creation Museum, usually based on actual visits:
*John Scalzi at Whatever
*Panda's Thumb
*A photo guide to the museum (by a blogger)
*Pharyngula — following PZ Myers and a group who toured it in August 2009.
*Secular Student Alliance visits the museum
*"Kentucky Fried Creation"
*The Buffalo Beast visits the Creation Museum in "Let There Be Retards"
*The Thinking Atheist visits it as well and describes his top 10 lessons learned here.
*Righting America at the Creation Museum
==Notes==
==References==
Category:Answers in Genesis
Category:Creationism
Category:Dinosaurs
Category:Pseudoscience