[extropy-chat] hard to believe, I know, but...

[Damien Broderick]

...Australians can be idiots too!

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-na-creation11feb11,0,1477689,full.story?coll=la-home-headlines

(wealthy idiots, at that, so maybe not so stupid)

<A former high-school biology teacher, Ham travels the [USA] training 
children as young as 5 to challenge science orthodoxy... Answers in Genesis 
is the biggest of these ministries. Ham co-founded the nonprofit in his 
native Australia in 1979. The U.S. branch, funded mostly by donations, has 
an annual budget of $15 million and 160 employees who produce books and 
DVDs, maintain a comprehensive website, and arrange more than 500 speeches 
a year for Ham and four other full-time evangelists.

With pulpit-thumping passion, Ham insists the Bible be taken literally: God 
created the universe and all its creatures in six 24-hour days, roughly 
6,000 years ago.

Hundreds of pastors will preach a different message Sunday, in honor of 
Charles Darwin's 197th birthday. In a national campaign, they will tell 
congregations that it's possible to be a Christian and accept evolution.

Ham considers that treason. When pastors dismiss the creation account as a 
fable, he says, they give their flock license to disregard the Bible's 
moral teachings as well. He shows his audiences a graphic that places the 
theory of evolution at the root of all social ills: abortion, divorce, 
racism, gay marriage, store clerks who say "Happy Holidays" instead of 
"Merry Christmas.">