Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Natural Selection of Creationist Museums

Last month Sherry informed me that Kentucky's Creation Science Museum is in some financial hot water. That's why, when I came across this article about a Texas creationism museum, I began to wonder if there was a trend. Creationist museum auctioning mastodon skull.

DALLAS, Texas (AP) -- A Texas museum that teaches creationism is counting on the auction of a prehistoric mastodon skull to stave off extinction.

The founder and curator of the Mt. Blanco Fossil Museum, which rejects evolution and claims that man and dinosaurs coexisted, said it will close unless the Volkswagen-sized skull finds a generous bidder.

"If it sells, well, then we can come another day," Joe Taylor said. "This is very important to our continuing."

Heritage Auction Galleries says the skull is estimated to be 40,000 years old, and projects it will fetch upward of $160,000. The artifact discovered in La Grange in 2004 is believed to be the largest of its kind, Heritage spokesman David Herskowitz said....

Claims on the museum's Web site include that Noah took dinosaurs aboard his ark...."We've struggled so long here just to keep this thing going," Taylor said. "We're kind of losing interest. You can just tread water for so long."

In the struggle for natural resources, some museums succeed and leave progeny, while unfit museums perish without offspring. Natural selection does not seem to smile upon creationist museums these days. Of course, if Noah had taken them on his ark like the dinosaurs (really? I thought that was why they died.), they would not have to tread water.

1 comment:

Marvin said...

A creationist museum funded by the sales of a fossil... There's more than a little irony here, methinks.