Creationism - National Center for Science Education

Among the attendees at the Summer Institutes I attended was someone from my
parents’ small town in Connecticut, and a college student who had just completed—and
obviously disputed—the UCLA introductory biology course for non-majors. Another
attendee was the author of The Unseen Hand: An Introduction to the Conspiratorial View
of History (Epperson 1985), a massive compendium exposing all the manifestations of
the sinister Conspiracy. The chapter “Science versus Reason” presents creation-science,
which the Conspiracy is trying to suppress.
Other ICR activities include expeditions and field research, notably the Ararat
searches for Noah’s Ark led by John Morris. ICR offers annual week-long Grand
Canyon trips 21 of several types; I attended a back-packing and camping trip to the bottom
of the Canyon offered for graduate credit as a field-study course (Biology/Geology 537),
which I have described elsewhere (“A Creationist Walk Through the Grand Canyon,”
McIver 1987a).
ICR publishes a Technical Monograph series; in order of appearance, Gish’s
Speculations and Experiments Relating to Theories on the Origin of Life (1972),
Slusher’s Critique of Radiometric Dating (1981; originally 1973), Woods’s Center of the
Earth (1973), Barnes’ Origins and Destiny of the Earth’s Magnetic Field (1983;
originally 1973), Marlyn Clark’s Our Amazing Circulatory System: By Chance or
Creation? (1976), Slusher and Robertson’s Age of the Solar System (1982; originally
1978), Slusher and Gamwell’s Age of the Earth (1978), Slusher’s Origin of the Universe:
An Examination of the Big Bang and Steady State Cosmogonies (1980; originally 1978)
and Age of the Cosmos (1980), Slusher and Ramirez’s Motion of Mercury’s Perihelion
(1984), and Austin’s Catastrophes and Earth History (1984). ICR plans to publish ICR
masters theses as Technical Monographs also. Richard Bliss directs a team of writers
each summer who have produced several volumes in the ICR Two-Model Children’s
Book series.
OTHER ACTIVE CREATIONIST GROUPS AND LEADERS
Students for Origins Research began as a student creation-science group at UC
Santa Barbara, and now has several branches on other campuses. SOR publishes Origins
Research, a twice-yearly newspaper which is distributed free to college students and
educators. SOR is relatively non-dogmatic, and is the most open-minded of the major
creation-science groups. It does not require members to submit to any statement of
belief, and freely publishes anti-creationist as well as creationist opinions and articles in
its periodical. SOR tries to promote dialogue between creationists and evolutionists,
dealing only with scientific and philosophical topics and attempting to avoid religious or
political issues. Dennis Wagner, an SOR founder and editor of its journal, advises local
creation-science groups to affiliate themselves with student groups so that they can use
campus facilities available to registered campus organizations (1985). Paul Nelson,
grandson of Byron Nelson, and currently a graduate student at the University of Chicago,
writes well-informed reviews for Origins Research. Besides their journal, SOR’s major
project has been a computerized database system, CREVO/IMS (Creation/Evolution
Information Management System), designed to provide college students with sources of
21 The BSA has led Grand Canyon trips for many years, and the CRS now has a Grand Canyon Research
Station, referred to frequently in CRSQ