On the subject of the "debate" between Bill Nye and Ken Ham, here's a reassuring -- if all too rare -- statement by a former young-earth creationist who unshackled his mind. Reading the whole thing provides context, as well as happiness:
... I'm writing all this because I don't know many people who were as far into the creation science movement as I was and came out of it. After graduating high school, I went on to college and got my bachelor's degree in physics; I now work in energy policy. Despite four years of physics, it still took me a long time before I actually came to understand evolution, geology and cosmology.
...
... I'm amazed by the amount of evidence I systematically ignored or explained away, just because it didn't match creation science.
Creationism isn't just one belief; it's a system of beliefs and theories that all support each other. We believed that unless we could maintain confidence in special creation, a young planet, a global flood, and the Tower of Babel, we'd be left without any basis for maintaining our faith.
... As long as people think the foundation of their religious faith depends on denial of science, it takes incredible energy to make them question the simple explanations given by the creationist movement.
...
I had never known creationism was only invented a scant 50 years ago (six-day-young-earth creationism was never a fundamentalist dogma until the 1960s).
I had never known that most Christians accepted the Bible's creation account as deliberate allegory many centuries before scientists even knew the Earth revolved around the sun.
...
I want people to be free to learn, free to understand, free to explore the fantastic mysteries of the universe without being tied down to phony dogma. I want children to learn how to trust the scientific method and, more importantly, how to use the scientific method so their creativity and imagination won't be wasted trying to defend pseudoscience...
Amen, brother. (By the time you read this, the "debate" will have happened.)[Image source]
