by Melissa Lee (a.k.a. LilaMae)
I’m completely baffled at why creationists have to say the world is 6000 years old when there’s such a simple and elegant means of eliminating this interminable conflict they have with reality.
I grew up Catholic. Which means I had no problem with cognitive dissonance, of course. But I remember distinctively the first time I watched Inherit The Wind and the scene in which Spencer Tracy’s character explains to a creationist that the first “day” (as mentioned in Genesis) could have been any length of time – not necessarily 24 hours – because there was no sun yet. Indeed it could have been a few billion years.
Works for me. Bam. Done. What’s for dinner?
Makes perfect sense to me. Creationists could easily just let it go there but nooooo, that doesn’t do it for them. Well, could someone please put a goddamn asterisk footnote in Genesis from now on in future bible printings:
“…and on the first *day God created…”
*the term “day” is misleading here because the sun – the standard measurement for Earth day length – hadn’t been created yet, therefore in all fairness, there’s no reason to think it couldn’t have been, oh….say….4.54 billion years. Now stay the fuck out of science classes!
I think it’ll work. I do. Either that or we just paint a giant tunnel on the side of a mountain with the sign above it that says “Heaven”.
Cognitive dissonance. Why you no haz it?
Minnesota Skeptics 