Are you a bored scientist looking to spank a few confused creationists for money? Then why not take up this challenge:

Dr. Joseph Mastropaolo, who says he has set up the contest, the Literal Genesis Trial, in the hope of improving the quality of arguments between creationists and evolutionists, has pledged to put $10,000 of his own money into an escrow account before the debate. His competitor would be expected to do the same. The winner would take the $20,000 balance.

The problem with this minitrial, as you might have already surmised by now, is that a ‘judge’ is supposed to weigh the merits of the argument and rule on whether or not evolution is a scientific theory. If the guy has ever taken antibiotics, then it should be a five minute affair. Fossils, modern genetics, geology, and a host of other disciplines have already proven the reality of evolution to the satisfaction of anyone not already married to a fairy-tale cosmogony. What exactly does this moron thinks constitutes proof, anyway? What kind of vigorous research was he engaged in?

Mastropaolo started making public arguments in favor of creationism about 13 years ago, after reading an article about evolution in the newspaper.

We all know what a great job newspapers do when reporting scientific news. Sounds like this guy probably read a poorly written article about something that (inevitably) conflicted with his “magic man done it” explanation of the world, and he became so passionate about it that he decided to devote his time, energy and money trying to disprove gravity evolution.

Mastropaolo believes that evolution cannot be proved scientifically. “It turns out that there is nothing in the universe [that] is evolving, everything is devolving, everything is going in the opposite direction,” he said.

See, even if that were true (which it isn’t), that would be a mechanism of evolution itself, and not proof of the Bible at all. For this clown to be correct, species would have had to ‘appear’ out of thin air, with no ancestral lines. In fact, it’s not just biological evolution you have to look at: even our own solar system went through its own change, from a giant cloud of gas to a complex solar system with 8 planets, countless moons and an as yet unknown amount of planetoids. According to the Bible, this process was also fairly instantaneous, with light appearing 4 days before the Sun. Are we to expect that he would need to prove his fairy tale bullshit in order to win as well? Somehow, I think not.

This gigantic waste of time – designed once again to try and bring attention to infantile ideas about the mechanism of life – isn’t likely to draw much attention from anyone, nor should it. It’s yet another attempt by creationists to pretend like there is something intellectual about the notion that “God did it”. Maybe we should send Kenneth Miller over there to school their asses? Sure, he has his own share of idiotic beliefs (such as quantum indeterminacy being the mechanism with which God gave the first monkey man a ‘soul’), but there’s no denying the fact he’s got enough experience with creationists that he could knock this one out of the park. What do you say Ken? Want to make a quick ten grand?