Creation Museum

The Creation Museum is a controversial museum in the United States, which presents the genesis for a Christian world teaching the young-earth creationism.

Content and Objectives

The museum is located in Petersburg, Boone County, not far from Cincinnati in the State of Kentucky and has a floor area of about 5000 m². The museum was founded by Answers in Genesis, a non-profit Christian fundamentalist club. The cost of 27 million U.S. dollars ( about 20 million euros ) were raised through donations. The groundbreaking ceremony for the museum was laid on 17 March 2001.

Opened on May 28, 2007 Museum houses, among other animated dinosaurs and Adam and Eve as electronically controlled puppets.

The museum was established in the light of increased efforts to introduce creationism in the curricula of U.S. schools. The essential key messages should be there:

• Earth and universe are about 6000 years old. Both were created in a seven- day-long creation week.
• As the first man, Adam and Eve were created, with Eve was created out of Adam's rib.
• God exterminated all humans and animals except for Noah's family and the animals in the Ark by the deluge from.
• Geological formations like the Grand Canyon had been created within a few months of the flood.
• Controversial is the fate of the dinosaurs. This could have been wiped out by the flood or have lived on the dragon until the recent past.

Criticism and controversy

Among other things, 3,000 U.S. teachers protested that with the opening of the museum " a lie institutionalized " will. Also, researchers and other groups expressed their concerns. So signed nearly 600 university professors a petition against the opening, which was called " Campaign to Defend the Constitution". This gave the following statement:

" We, the undersigned scientists at universities and colleges in Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana, are Concerned about Scientifically inaccurate materials at the Answers in Genesis museum. Students who accept this material as Scientifically valid are unlikely to succeed in science courses at the college level. "

"We, the undersigned scientists at universities and colleges in Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana are worried about the scientifically wrong materials in the Answers -in- genesis- Museum. Students who accept this material as scientifically correct, are likely to insist on college-level no check. "

The British politician, physician and filmmaker Robert Winston visited the museum at the turn of the BBC documentary " The Story of God" and commented:

"It was alarming to see so much time, money and effort being spent on making a mockery of hard won scientific knowledge. And the factthat it what being done with seeking Obvious sincerity, somehow made ​​it all the worse. "

"It was alarming to see that so much time, money and energy has been used for to transform the scientific knowledge painfully acquired a laughingstock. The fact that it was made with such obvious sincerity, made it somehow just got worse "

2010 wrote the author AA Gill that this museum is not only directed against the teaching of evolution, but against geology, anthropology, paleontology, the science of history, the teaching of chemistry, astronomy, zoology, biology, and good taste. It would be contrary directly or indirectly, almost every natural science "

In February 2011, two heterosexual men from Louisville were refused entry because the museum guards suspected to be gay. In 2012 it was reported that the public interest would subside. In November 2012 Answers in Genesis reported by a visitor to decline by 10% to 254 074.

Film

In the documentary Religulous by Bill Maher Maher visited the museum and interviewed the founder Kenneth Ham. When he asks Ham why the overwhelming majority of scientists holds the world's central statements of the Museum of wrong, he says Maher, that man would rebel against his Creator.

Similar facilities

• The Creation Evidence Museum in Glen Rose, Texas. This institution was founded and is trying to prove that humans and dinosaurs lived together 6,000 years ago in 1984.
• Dinosaur Adventure Land in Pensacola, Florida. This was founded in 2001 by Kent Hovind and also aims to suggest the coexistence of dinosaurs and humans. Meanwhile, it is shut down.
• Big Valley Creation Science Museum in Big Valley, Canada. The institution asserts men and dinosaurs had coexisted.
• The Institute for Creation Research in Santee, California (near San Diego ) includes the "Museum of Creation and Earth History". Here the evolution is contradicted.
• The Museum of Earth History in Dallas, Texas formerly Eureka Springs, Arkansas representing similar positions as the Creation Museum. It contains dinosaur bones and assumes that the dinosaurs were wiped out by the biblical Flood. Adam and Eve had previously lived with dinosaurs, including tyrannosaurs.