I have to point out that Kent Hovind is in prison for tax evasion, not for being wrong about evolution (though I’m sure he’d like you to think that!).
I’ve actually met the man, I went to a Christian school as a child and he was a guest speaker at more than one assembly. It’s only years later that I realize how ignorant and intentionally blind to the facts he is, and that his arguments rested entirely on straw men and a misunderstanding of the evidence. It slowed my understanding of science by at least five years, maybe more, and I’m more than just a little pissed about that.
It wasn’t until I saw japanese mud-skippers in a nature show a few years ago that it really clicked—one of his slams against evolution was “why don’t you see fish crawling out of the water?” Well, there you go. 100% fish, living on land—they crawl into mud periodically to breath, pretty cool really. Their front fins are even elongated and act more like fingerless arms than paddles. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a hundred other similar species of fish out there.
When you realize that the theory of evolution has been accurately guiding biologists’ expectations for life in bizarre places, and archaeologists’ and paleontologists’ expectations for artifacts and fossils, for many decades, it becomes clear who was right and who was wrong, just as a matter of practical application. It can be hard to see this when you’ve been taught to dismiss evolution out of hand, though, and Hovind’s intellectually bankrupt arguments give you a fake foundation on which to base such dismissal, so long as you don’t question it too much.
Well the incarcerated* Kent Hovind did used to say that evolution is a religion. But I never heard him saying it was “just” a religion.
*HAD to include that
I have to point out that Kent Hovind is in prison for tax evasion, not for being wrong about evolution (though I’m sure he’d like you to think that!).
I’ve actually met the man, I went to a Christian school as a child and he was a guest speaker at more than one assembly. It’s only years later that I realize how ignorant and intentionally blind to the facts he is, and that his arguments rested entirely on straw men and a misunderstanding of the evidence. It slowed my understanding of science by at least five years, maybe more, and I’m more than just a little pissed about that.
It wasn’t until I saw japanese mud-skippers in a nature show a few years ago that it really clicked—one of his slams against evolution was “why don’t you see fish crawling out of the water?” Well, there you go. 100% fish, living on land—they crawl into mud periodically to breath, pretty cool really. Their front fins are even elongated and act more like fingerless arms than paddles. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a hundred other similar species of fish out there.
When you realize that the theory of evolution has been accurately guiding biologists’ expectations for life in bizarre places, and archaeologists’ and paleontologists’ expectations for artifacts and fossils, for many decades, it becomes clear who was right and who was wrong, just as a matter of practical application. It can be hard to see this when you’ve been taught to dismiss evolution out of hand, though, and Hovind’s intellectually bankrupt arguments give you a fake foundation on which to base such dismissal, so long as you don’t question it too much.
Walking catfish—they actually just sort of slither, but they can locomote.