14 DAY TRIAL // Every winter, the Smithsonian is host to some unusual visitors. People regularly come here to witness a compared history of evolution and to better understand how we came to be the way we are. But, for a distinct group of persons, namely for creationists or for adepts of Intelligent Design (ID), these trips are meant to further strengthen their beliefs in the fact that God was the one who created humans in their modern shape. Also, they seek to distort scientific facts and use their own interpretations in establishing how human beings and other species evolved.
For example, professor David DeWitt, from the Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., brings his class, which is called Advanced Creation Studies, to the museum simply to help strengthen the notions that are thought to pupils in the classroom. The entire curriculum at this university is meant to denote that the idea of ID does not necessarily exclude all the scientific discoveries that have been made until this point, but holds that the data evolutionary biologists now have are mis-interpreted and distorted.
In learning institutions such as this one, the view of evolution is taken directly from the Book of Genesis, and the students and their teachers seek to find clues that verify the book by looking at evidence presented to them by real scientists. However, they seem more willing to distort the truth, rather than accept it. As soon as some piece of information doesn't fit with what they believe, they do not question the facts in a 2,000-year-old book, but doubt the most modern scientific techniques.
Thus, they uphold that the rocks in the Grand Canyon are not several tens of millions of years old, as carbon dating shows, but that they are, in fact, as young as several thousands of years. Similarly, they say that people have not evolved over millions of years from primates, but that God created the first man, Adam, about 9 to 10,000 years ago. If they so conveniently move the timelines as they see fit, it stands to reason that they will find every answer they need.
To their own praise, creationists do not engage in fruitless conversations with museum curators, or with adepts of evolution. Representatives stress that they only want to train their minds to think critically, and not only maintain discussions on a theoretical level. But the main problem is that these teachers are training a whole new generation of ID proponents, which will not argue scientists based on Biblical interpretations, but on false, so-called “scientific evidences.” And, at that time, they will find it a lot easier to trick a lot of individuals than they do now.