Creationism conspiracy theory

Creationism is what drew me into skepticism. Back in the 90s when I was lecturing in software development, I had a work colleague who was a young earth creationist. Seemingly rational in other areas of his life, and very intelligent, he was nevertheless hooked on “creation science”. It showed to me how even smart people can be taken in when they have an emotional stake in the topic.

An interesting article appeared on The Conversation by Professor Paul Braterman from the University of Glasgow likening creationism to conspiracy theories. The article was also featured on the snopes.com website - a site dedicated to fact-checking claims.

While the article is very US-centric, it is an interesting read. The prominent organisation supporting (and financially benefiting from this conspiracy) is Answers in Genesis, run by Ken Ham (originally from Australia). Responding to the criticism in the article they sicced one of their attack dogs, in the form of Ham's son-in-law Bodie Hodge, onto it. It's an exceedingly long “rebuttal” of the points that Professor Braterman makes. It's difficult to make it through the response but Hodge's main weapon of attack is to point out logical fallacies, himself committing the fallacy fallacy. It just goes to show that there's a lot more to skepticism than being able to reel off a list of fallacies that you think somebody is committing.