The young man is 15-years old. He had contacted Paul Price and wanted to talk. This kind of caught me off gaurd since I’m used to dealing with old retired guys on the net half the time, and I didn’t know of this gentleman’s age until the ZOOM video conference started! I presumed someone so bold and assertive would be a college graduate or something.
I think I need to institute a policy that if anyone younger than 18 wants to have conversations like this, their parents should appear on the video and give consent.
I’m not out convert Old Earther’s into YECs. That’s not my mission. I’m out to investigate evidence for and against my YEC/YCC beliefs and report and teach them honestly to the best of my abilities. I tried to act responsibly and tell the young man there are serious theoretical and empirical issues with the YEC/YCC view.
That said, I don’t hide my strong biases against universal common descent or the theory of “natural” selection. That’s a different story than the issue of Old Universe/Earth. YECs like Paul Price tend to lump all the issues into one category.
As I pointed out, Paul was speaking for himself, but he works for CMI. The organization I’m associated with is not so dogmatic in their dealings with opposing viewpoints. In fact, in my ID circles, I don’t even know half the time what someone’s views are on the age of the Universe. I refrain from asking unless it’s brought up. Same for their religious views. For example, I when I met Jonathan Wells, I didn’t bring up his affiliations with the Unification Church of reverend Sung Myung Moon. I don’t raise issues about Michale Behe’s Catholicism, or Lee Spetner’s Judaism, or Paul Giem’s Seventh Day Aventism, or so-and-so’s Mormonism, or Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig Jehovah’s witness background. If one wants to start an inter-necine conflict in ID circles, just bring up people’s denominational affiliations and start talking religious doctrine.