'The Science Guy' Bill Nye and Ken Ham, founder of the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky are set to debate evolution tonight at 7 p.m. ET at the Museum. Live stream will be available on Debatelive.org, and it is being hosted by Google+ Hangouts On Air through YouTube. The topic will be, "Is creation a viable model of origins in today's modern scientific era?" (YouTube Live Stream link below)
CNN correspondent Tom Foreman will moderate the debate. According to the organizer, the debate tickets were sold out in two minutes when they went on sale online.
Immediately at the conclusion of the debate, Bill Nye and Ken Ham will walk inside the Creation Museum next door to be interviewed for the Piers Morgan Live program on CNN for a 9:45 PM post-debate analysis.
Over 10,000 churches, schools, colleges, and other groups have informed the museum that they will be carrying the free live stream of the debate. Liberty University in Virginia, which conferred an honorary doctorate on Ham, will show a live stream of the debate in a 1,500-seat auditorium on campus.
According to a Pew Research Center analysis published in December last year, six in ten Americans (60 percent) said that "humans and other living things have evolved over time," while a third (33 percent) rejected the idea of evolution, saying that "humans and other living things have existed in their present form since the beginning of time."
Ham is a leading creation apologist and president/CEO of Answers in Genesis (AiG), the Bible-defending organization behind the museum and sponsor of the event.
The topic of evolution was chosen "because our ministry theme for 2013 and for 2014 is 'Standing Our Ground, Rescuing Our Kids,' our staff thought that a debate on creation vs. evolution with a man who has influenced so many children to believe in evolution would be a good idea," Ham wrote in his blog on the Answers in Genesis' website.
"This debate will help highlight the fact that so many young people are dismissing the Bible because of evolution, and even many young people who had grown up in the church decided to leave the church because they saw evolution as showing the Bible could not be trusted." Ham added.
Nye explained the reason for the debate in a CNN article, "It seems to me that Ham is a fundamentalist. Around the world there are billions of people, who embrace the facts and process of modern science, and they enjoy their faith. By all accounts, their faith enriches their lives. These people have no conflict with their faith and science. Ham is unique in this regard."
