Nice quote Egan. That book (1984) is perhaps even more pertinent today than it was when it was written.

Bex, I'll pick up some points you made. First and foremost, I do not credit Hovind with anything sensible that I'd be interested in listening to. If evolutionists refused to debate with him, I imagine it was because either they had better things to do, or they knew he would keep telling them what they said was a pack of lies. If someone says "I don't believe it," no matter what you present to them, where does that get you? In that video I saw, one of the things he did was talk about dinosaurs evolving into birds. Where was the transition dinosaur/bird, he said, that had wings and not arms but couldn't fly, how silly he said. We have fossils of a variety of dinosaurs that had feathers but didn't appear to fly, and the ostrich is around today, it gets by OK. (Ooops, sorry, all those fossils are fakes from China made so people can get easy money, every last one of them.) I don't think we know yet exactly how one form evolves into another, how long it takes, whether there is a sudden big change, etc. But admitting we don't know, is light years away from saying it's all a bunch of bunk then, God created it all as it is and evolution is a myth. That is the technique Hovind seems to use a lot -- there are some things we don't know, and because we don't know, it means the who idea can be rubbished.

If you can give me links to info about these people who you say are ex-evolutionists and yet who are not religious, I will look at them. I'd like to know what these people are thinking and I'd be more ready to take it seriously than someone thumping their Bible and telling us that the story in Genesis is word-for-word fact.

There is much talk here about getting lies out of textbooks. I do not agree that the examples I saw Hovind take from textbooks are lies, though it's difficult to get an idea of what is really being said in the books because of the nature of his presentation. But yes, I will go so far as to say that the language in textbooks can sometimes be patronising and arrogant. Yes, technically evolutiuon is a theory and it should be called just that. And all the evidence should be given for it, which would be a textbook in itself, if not a series of them. If a child cries because this idea destroys their religious faith, then I would say this is a good thing. Why does evolution need to destroy anyone's religious faith? If that child has been told to believe in the Bible literally, then thanks to the light of knowledge and education he/she is being made to question what their parents told them, and start to think for themselves. If other students decided that they saw holes in some of the things they studied about evolution, good for them -- let them get some training and go out and investigate and learn, and report back to the world.

Any good scientist will be willing to refine or change their theory completely if convincing evidence arises that challenges. It should be an exciting learning process. And yes, a lot of people stick to outdated ideas far too long, simply being unwilling to change. An open mind in any discipline is always important. I can't imagine what evidence would ever convince me to say gosh yes, a divine being really did create the world. But have a go, I'll look at anything you give, as long as it's not a very long video, I haven't got the time for that. So far I haven't seen anything that a hole 10 feet wide can't be blown into.

Linda.