Answers in Genesis - Scientific Staff ????

I was involved on another forum in a discussion with someone, who kept throwing out AIG's expert scientific staff. So I did some checking and here they are, in all their glory:

Dr. Weiland - medical doctor
Dr. White - ex chemist/college registrar (no research in 30 years)
Dr. Walker - mechanical engineer
Mr. Tilton - ex Navy - Bob Jones U. grad (eeeeeeeek)
Mr. Stevens - minister
Mr. Sparrow - ex high school teacher
Dr. Silvestru - ex geologist (Romania) (no research I can find)
Mr. Schwartzman - ex zoo keeper
Dr. Safarti - ex chemist (amateur physicist and known fraud)
Mr. Robertson - ex hydrologist, now a minister
Dr. Parker - ex zoologist
Mr. Oard - ex meteorologist
Dr. Mortenson - geology historian now a minister
Dr. Menton - ex anatomist
Ms. McKeever - ? (works with young kids)
Dr. Kruger - ex zoologist (nematodes)
Mr. Kendy - ex air traffic controller
Mr. Jack - ex school teacher
Mr Ham - CEO of AIG - no qualifications
Mr. Fangrad - electronics technician
Dr. Driggers - ex telecommunications
Mr. DeRoos - agricultural science
Mr. Davis - singer/artist (known for fake dinosaur bone fraud in Alaska)
Dr. Catchpole - ex horticulturist
Mr. Berra - ex food science
Mr. Bell - ex high school teacher
Dr. BaumGardner - geophysicist (noted for CPT theory, and his government boss writing a letter stating his computer code has been misused in flood research)
Dr. Batten - ex agriculture
Mr. Bates - ? (no qualifications?)
Mr A. Bates - ex firefighter
Mr. Armstrong - ex marketer

Not exactly the National Academy of Sciences or the Royal Society.

This info is from AIG themselves, so I don't know the accuracy but I'll take them at their word.

Not a single physicist, except BaumGardner who has been rebuked by using his computer code to a problem other geophysicists say it isn't applicable for.

Not a single astronomer/astrophysicist/cosmologist - what a surprise

Not a single biologist/molecular biologist/biochemist/paleontologist/archeologist.

A couple of ex chemists and zoologists - none currently working in the field.

Otherwise a collection of laymen with little to no scientific training.

**** Another key point is that almost every single person on this list is employed full time by AIG *****

Their livelihood depends on their maintaining a YEC position. Unlike the academic community where tenure provides academic freedom, I'll hazard a guess that AIG would terminate you pretty quickly if you changed your view, or your research supported mainstream science. Of course their 'research' is fixed from the get go so as to not do this.

Also go to AIG website (www.answersingenesis.org) and read these peoples testimonials.

Several of them specifically say, once I was converted to Christ and YEC I knew I had to look harder at science to back this up (I'm paraphrasing of course.) Thus they looked, and they found it of course because they had set their whole faith to be dependent upon it. Way to go for intellectual integrity.

Yeah, its amazing that AIG is against evolution so much, yet they dont have any biologists, the field that Evolution is in.

Also, its interesting to note that AIG makes their people sign a "statement of faith" that basically says that no matter what the evidence says, a literal 6000 year old earth and 6 day creation is correct.

__________________

Wei wu wei

Green faeries

And they have the gall to say that non-YEC scientists have an agenda to pursue! When the person signing your paycheck indicates that only one possible result is allowed, it is not surprising that you go out and find that result.

Check their statement of faith that they require their members to adhere to. Part of it includes automatically dismissing anything contrary to their preconceived beliefs. They are a paradigm of intellectual dishonesty.

__________________
Creationism has not made a single contribution to agriculture, medicine, conservation, forestry, pathology, or any other applied area of biology. Creationism has yielded no classifications, no biogeographies, no underlying mechanisms, no unifying concepts with which to study organisms or life. - Botanical Society of America's Statement on Evolution

--Have you seen this letter, if you have, please post it here or e-mail it to me please. I would like to have a look.

Cheers,
-Chris Grose

Perhaps I have should have used the word alleged letter.

I have seen reference to this.

I believe the story is that his employer (Los Alamos) was asked about his mantle code being used for flood research. The response I heard was that the code was not applicable for such a question and that his supervisor distanced their group from such work. At the time this was occurring I believe the code in question was not even working correctly for it's intended purpose.

Correct me if I am wrong here, because this story is definitely out there.

I will say one thing about BaumGardner's CPT work though.

It's ****.

His program actually models plate tectonics quite well. The trouble is when he uses it for Creationist work he changes (miraculously - and he admits he needs a divine event to make this happen) the thermal diffusivity and such parameters of the mantle to get his runaway subduction.

This is not science.

Also let's be clear about BaumGardner - he's not a geologist or really a geophysicist any more - he's a computer modeler.

I honestly haven't heard much about CPT for years - as it's main points had been found to be flawed years ago.

Where does the heat go being a big problem? Where is the huge volcanic region from the magma bubble?

--I never heard it. But anyways, if you come accross it, don't hesitate to post it.

Cheers,
-Chris Grose

I'll try to find it.

I read the reference a week or so ago.

Also if memory serves me right I recall when the CPT theory came out I guess over a decade ago now it was on TV about a Los Alamos scientist being a creationist and I thought back then Los Alamos stressed this was Baumgardner's out of work hobby and they didn't want it to be associated with them.

Anyway, I shall try to find the story.

--No, this is a common misconception. No relevant parameters (such as thermal conductivity) are messed with in his 2D simulations. However, he does scale some parameters in his 3D simulations, but you must do this in any 3D run, even in the mainstream literature he has to do this to get the accurate results. The reason for doing this is not ad hoc, but is merely the result of the lack in computer power to handle the 3D runs, and so parameters are scaled to compensate for the decrease in the grid resolution. The only purpose of his 3D simulations is to show the tectonic style of plate motion predicted during runaway subduction and CPT. And so, his modeling of runaway subduction and CPT is not [whatever you have in asterisks].

--Actually his reasons for doing this are about as scientific as science can get.

--No.. he is a geophysicist.

--You mean like an anomalously high thermal diffusivity?

--The only heat problem is that resulting from the cooling of the newly forming oceanic lithosphere, there exists no heat problem wth runaway subduction itself. And this problem is currently under research, but we have some good suggestions. Furthermore the heat released by the runaway subduction of pre-flood ocean lithosphere is released deep in the mantle and so does not impose a significant problem.

--Please clarify what you ean by 'the huge volcanic region from the magma bubble'.

Cheers,
-Chris Grose