Both sides dig in deeply

Over the origins of the Grand Canyon.

How appropriate, then, that the Grand Canyon — its age, to be precise — has become a big issue in the ongoing argument about creationism and the role it will play in our understanding of the world.

Frustrated by the National Park Service's insistence that the visitors center continue to sell a book with a creationist account of the canyon's formation, a public employees group is accusing the service of invalidating science and promoting fundamentalist religion.

It's not as though the two sides are splitting hairs: Most scientists estimate the canyon's age at about 6 million years. Young-Earth creationists, who believe in the literal account of the world's creation laid out in the Bible's book of Genesis, contend it's closer to 4,500 years.

The protesting group, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, an alliance of scientists, land managers, environmental advocates and others, calls it distressing that the park service is not sticking to pure, mainstream geology in the information it dispenses at the Grand Canyon.

The stakes seem even higher to some on the creationist side. If their rhetoric is any indication, nothing short of the existence of God hinges on their "proving" that the canyon was not the result of gradual geologic processes, but of Noah's flood.

Which ties back to these posts discussing the book being sold that supports the religious version.

Update: Ooo! Thinking Christians fight back and support Evolution Sunday!

Flocks of the Christian faithful in the US will this Sunday hold special services celebrating Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. The idea is to stand up to creationism, which claims the biblical account of creation is literally true, and which is increasingly being promoted under the guise of "intelligent design". Proponents of ID say the universe is so complex it must have been created by some unnamed designer.

Support for "Evolution Sunday" has grown 13 per cent to 530 congregations this year, from the 467 that celebrated the inaugural event last year. Organisers see it as increasing proof that Christians are comfortable with evolution.

Update: Tengrain over at Mock Paper Scissors has a note about the Creationist Museum where Adam and Eve's amazingly buttoned up children cavort with raptor dinosaurs.

Update 2/14: Letters to the New York Times about the mixing of science and religion.