Which of the terms mythological, symbolic, theological is most appropriate when discussing biblical tropes?
Apparently, it’s ‘theological’ because it has an air of respectability, whereas the other terms suggest something with only theoretical underpinning. In fact, this also applies to ‘theological’, which by definition is the study of deities, for which there is no evidential verification. The use of ‘theological’ therefore is as unsubstantive as arguing that a concept is metaphorical or symbolic. None of these terms represents a sound, reliable way to determine the accuracy, historicity or truth of religious claims.
With this in mind see how you do with these questions:
1. Did the original hearers of the Genesis creation story regard it as –
a) true.
b) a theological statement.
c) an entertaining myth.
Of course we’ve no way of knowing what the story’s original hearers thought but there is nothing in the text that suggests they would have regarded the creation story as anything but true. The creators of Jesus’ script certainly seemed to think so, a few centuries later and its original hearers would not have felt the need to preserve it otherwise. In this belief they were wrong.
2. Which of these gospel stories is true, as in ‘really happened more or less as described’ –
a) The virgin birth with its surrounding detail.
b) Jesus meeting with Moses and Elijah (the transfiguration).
c) Resurrected corpses roaming around Jerusalem.
d) The resurrection.
The answer is that either all of them are true or none of them are. If only one of them is mythic, symbolic or ‘theological’ (and more than one of them most certainly is) then it is highly likely the others are too. If we are scrupulous, we cannot assert that one story is symbolic because it’s making a theological point while another equally implausible story is historically accurate because we want it to be.
The criteria for determining the historicity of any story from antiquity are corroborative evidence and, failing that, plausibility. We have already established that there is no independent corroboration for many of the gospel stories. There is no corroboration for some of them even in the Bible itself. We are left then with plausibility: how plausible is it that a virgin gave birth or that resurrected corpses presented themselves to Jewish authorities? Vanishingly small. Jesus’ encounter with Moses and Elijah is equally improbable.
Is his resurrection the exception? No, because dead people do not spring back to life 36 hours after being buried. If the virgin birth, the transfiguration and the resurrection of dead saints are all highly implausible (and they are) then so is the resurrection. It is at best, a story making a theological point but it is not history. The implausibility it shares with many of the other implausible stories in the gospels discounts it as history. There are no grounds for saying it is the exception.
There is also the cumulative effect of implausibility. It is highly unlikely that one of the implausible events above is historical, but it is impossible that all four of them are. Add all the other implausible stories in the gospels – the other miracles; the healings; exorcisms; Jesus sparring with the devil, walking through locked doors and beaming up to heaven: piling implausibility on top of implausibility doesn’t make any of the component implausibilities more plausible. It makes all of them less plausible and collectively impossible.
The things the gospels tell us happened to Gospel Jesus, and those they say he did himself, are equalled only by heroes of myth. Did Osiris or Romulus rise from the dead, as their stories claim? Did Augustus really become a god once he died? Of course not. These are the implausible, improbable events we find in myth. Jesus’ story is no different.
3. While many or all of the gospel stories are highly improbable as history because they are intended to convey a theological point, the words attributed to Jesus in the gospels –
a) are completely accurate.
b) are more or less what he said.
c) passed through an inestimable number of people, being invented, edited and altered in the process, before being written down 40+ years after Jesus supposedly uttered them.
d) are inventions of the gospel writers and/or their particular sect and frequently copied between gospels.
If you’re opting for a or b, you’re now making the logia the exception; the one oasis of historical truth in a desert of implausibility. That’s a big ask. To get this one off the ground, you have to call upon contrivances like –
completely reliable (but different and conflicting) oral traditions;
hypothetical lists of sayings;
Peter’s dictation to Mark;
eyewitness authors;
secret teachings;
super-translators and
the odd spot of collaboration.
So, c and/or d is far more likely to be the answer to this one, representing the explanation that requires the least conjecture and fewest hypothetical components.
How did you do? I expect most of you aced this end of term quiz. If not, better get down to some extra study and repeat the semester next year.
rejectingjesus, 
Excellent post, Neil.
One of your best, in my view.
I shall be nicking some of your points for future discussions with our indoctrinated friends, you can be sure!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thank you!
LikeLiked by 1 person
An event is plausible or implausible based on what?
LikeLike
On plausibility, Don. Plausibility.
Do such things happen in the real world? No, so they’re not plausible. Do they happen in stories? Yes, which means they’re fiction. It’s that easy.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Four hundred years ago a universe 14 billion years old and billions of light years across with hundreds of billions of galaxies was not plausible. Such things could not be conceived of as part of the real world. And the small piece of the universe that included our sun and moon and planets seemed to provide all the answers to all the questions we had.
We were wrong, of course. Our reality four hundred years ago was far too small.
So, how did our reality change? Further investigation. And the discovery of cause and effect relationships that revealed a larger universe.
How are the questions of whether there is a God or not, whether Jesus is the Son of God, whether miracles happen, whether there was a virgin birth, whether Jesus rose from the dead, etc. answered?
By history.
History is the record of real events that have real effects. So, we follow the money so to speak. We look at the facts of the present and work our way back to the facts that caused the present facts.
What we don’t do it decide on the basis of what we think we know that something is plausible or implausible. We can follow the facts with all kinds of things. We can determine if the Pilgrims arrived in Massechucettes in 1620 or not. Maybe it is just a myth. We can determine if the British navy defeated the Spanish armada. Or if it is just a myth.
We can do history rather than be satisfied with our prejudices.
Now, many things in history are one time events. The beginning of the universe is a one time event as far as we know, so we can’t actually repeat it in a science lab. But we can follow the facts. If we do, we find that it had a beginning. So, what was the event that caused the beginning? What event preceded it? We can theorize, but we cannot know for sure. Was there some previous natural event? Or was there some non-natural cause?
We don’t know for sure. But we can test the hypotheses to determine which answer is more probable. (Not plausible. Without testing, plausible is based on our prejudices.)
Is it more probable that chance is the cause or that some intelligence is the cause? The sequence of chance events that had to happen for the universe to exist and be as it is exceeds probability as we commonly use the word. But we do know that minds create things out of nothing. So, as for a cause, a mind is far more probable than chance. Is that absolutely the fact that explains the cause of the universe? No. Nothing is absolute. Not in science and not in history. There might be other causes or other facts we don’t know of. But based on what we do know, a mind is a better cause than chance. So, we have a working hypothesis that can be tested. If it succeeds as a hypothesis we can derive a theory. And from there we can determine if all the other questions are plausible or implausible BASED ON A TESTED THEORY OF REALITY and not on our prejudices.
LikeLike
You presuppose the gospels are history, in the same way accounts of the Spanish Armada are history. You’ve failed repeatedly to demonstrate that they are. When events are explained by
God/angels/demons/spirits, we can be sure we’re not dealing with history.
Determining whether something is implausible is not a ‘prejudice’. It is comparing the claim made with how reality operates. Magic, supernatural miracles and incantations don’t have any explanatory power in reality, therefore it is reasonable to conclude that events involving them are implausible.
You can haggle over words all you like, Don, but your conversion many years ago rested on your deciding that the claims of Christianity were plausible. You didn’t read everything you could lay your hands on about them, you didn’t conduct repeatable experiments to test their veracity and you created your rationale for your decision after you had made it, not before. Your emotional decision to throw your lot in with Jesus was made on the basis of your ‘prejudices’ and subjective judgement.
Don’t now tell us we can’t make our judgements contra those beliefs without first testing the claims of Christianity scientifically or by conducting historical research. We can do it by recognising the implausibility of those claims.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Neil When events are explained by
God/angels/demons/spirits, we can be sure we’re not dealing with history.
The determination of what is history and what is not goes the other way. As you define it is a circular argument. Start with the facts.
LikeLike
What do you mean, ‘history goes the other way’? This is a nonsensical statement. There is no serious history that begins with the assumption that the supernatural causes, directs or determines events.
Let’s start, as you suggest, with the facts: a number of 1st century Jews believed that an individual (possibly a real person, possibly a series of innervisions) was the Messiah. They believed he could do miraculous things and that his death atoned in some way for their sins. Later believers wrote stories about this individual.
These are the facts. The beliefs are the only facts.
LikeLiked by 2 people
What’s never been satisfactorily answered, IMO, is WHY did the Jews living in that first century accept Yeshua as the Messiah since he didn’t fit at all what they had been looking for; i.e., a delivererl
As Wikipedia notes, … the Jewish Messiah will be associated with events that had not occurred at the time of Jesus, such as the rebuilding of The Temple, a Messianic Age of peace, and the ingathering of Jews to their homeland..
But of course, as we all know, it wasn’t the Jewish scriptures that made a difference. It was our ol’ friend Paul who so adeptly put his spin on events and happenings.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Nan But of course, as we all know, it wasn’t the Jewish scriptures that made a difference.
It wasn’t so much the scripture as what they saw and heard from Jesus. Even the disciples had trouble with Jesus as Messiah, so Jesus just let them watch. As they did they came to the conclusion that Jesus was indeed the Messiah.
LikeLike
No serious history begins with any assumption. That was my point. To begin with any assumption creates a circular argument based on assumptions and prejudice.
As for the facts, beliefs are not facts. Facts are the primary source testimony of those who saw the events and the artifacts. Secondary sources can support the primary sources.
In this case we can start with the secondary sources of Tacitus and Suetonius both of whom affirm that there were a lot of Christians in Rome when Rome burned in 64 A,D. That supports Paul’s letter written to Christians in about the mid-50s and Acts’ first person primary source report of Christians in Rome in 62 AD.
That means that Christianity had reached Rome some time before and before the date of the expulsion of the Jews from Rome in 49 AD, According to Suetonius: “the Jews constantly made disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus” Most historians think that was a reference to Christ and it agrees with Acts 18:2.
I don’t have to remind you that was before any written gospel.
In the letter to Galatians and 1st Corinthians Paul mentions the Apostles he met with in Jerusalem. That is a first person report of someone who was there. That happened in about 50 AD. These Apostles are identified as men who had been with Jesus. Paul’s mention is a secondary source citation but it affirms what the Gospels later tell us.
In addition, Papias and Polycarp give first person primary source testimony of having heard John, the only remaining Apostle who had been with Jesus, and they heard him tell about Jesus from his personal experience.
To these first person reports and secondary support there is no equal facts to the contrary. Those are all as good as it gets history-wise. Doubting Jesus is to deny the facts of history. But what of his deeds and words?
Papias and Clement of Alexandria both say as secondary sources that Peter was the source of Mark’s Gospel. If so, that makes the narration of Peter (not the logia) in Mark a first person account. The text of Mark lends support for that. The text in Mark becomes an artifact attesting to Jesus.
Now, you can believe that or not, but history of that period does not get better than that.
Facts!
LikeLike
Yes, as I said, all we have is the fact people believed these things, not that they really happened.
Who says history doesn’t begin with assumptions? Of course it does, including the assumption that supernatural agency won’t be involved. People’s belief in such agency maybe, but not the actual involvement of gods, devils or angels (from the other reality you’re now proposing).
Anything that claims such entities move among us is not history. The gospels therefore are not history.
Face it, Don, you’re wasting your time with your increasingly desperate defence of your beliefs.
LikeLiked by 2 people
.Neil Yes, as I said, all we have is the fact people believed these things, not that they really happened.
That is what you have said, but it misunderstands the evidence of eyewitness testimony. You think that eyewitness testimony is something people “believed” rather than a report of what they saw or heard.
Of course, historians do not accept without question the reports of eyewitnesses. Nor do lawyers i a court of law. But they do not attack an eyewitness saying that is just what you “believe.” They ask was there person in a position to hear and see what he reports? Is he a reliable witness? Does he have some personal reason to create this story? And they ask about corroborative testimony and how his testimony agrees or does not with the artifacts.
So do that rather than resort to baseless accusations.
History or a legal trial that begins with assumptions about the witness or the events in question is prejudiced. (It is almost the definition of the word, pre-judging.) In America the accused is presumed innocent until proved guilty. That is intended to eliminate prejudice. It begins with facts. It is about facts.
But history is also built upon history. Nothing in history stands alone. That is why I offer the network of facts that confirm the history of the Gospels including the miracles reported. The proper thing if you are going to present a rebuttal is to present contrary evidence. Or show by facts presented that the witnesses are unreliable. Growling and howling does not do it.
LikeLike
For Chrissake, Don, we’ve been down this road. There are no eyewitness reports about Jesus in the Bible or any other frickin’ place. I know you want there to be, which is why you repeatedly insist, without evidence, that documents written 40-60 years after Jesus lived were created by eye-witnesses in their 80s (when life-expectancy was about 40 years), but they weren’t. No serious scholar thinks so. All we have are accounts that are who-knows-how-many generations of hearsay down the line (and that’s a best case scenario.)
Nor were the gospels written by historians who sought out geriatric eye-witnesses and then referenced their sources. Only Luke claims to have done any research, which it turns out is not much more than plagiarising Mark and Matthew.
These are not ‘baseless accusations’ or ‘howling and growling’, but what historians and New Testament scholars conclude. You are the one out of step, not them and not me.
I’ve grown tired of your constant recycling of the same old defence of your beliefs and the Bible. Unless you have anything new to say, I won’t post any more of the same tired, simplistic and discredited apologetics.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Neil There are no eyewitness reports about Jesus in the Bible or any other frickin’ place.
Keep telling yourself that. It makes dismissing Jesus a lot easier. Historians might have a good laugh. The people of the 1st century certainly would.
Luke. So, you reject the first-person testimony of a person who actually talked with eyewitnesses? You probably also reject the first-person passages of Acts. History doesn’t matter, right?
LikeLike
You do ņot know Luke ‘spoke to eye-witnesses’. He doesn’t claim to have done so. He says he’s aware of eye-witness accounts, which he implies he’s made use of. That’s all.
He does not tell us what these are, who the eye-witnesses were or whether he verified their testimony – as any competent historian would do. At best, he’s merely taken their word for it. You are the one making things up when you suggest he went around interviewing people.
Secondly, what on earth have the ‘we’ passages in Acts got to do with eye-witness accounts of Jesus? They haven’t. You’re chucking any irrelevance into the argument now, which shows how little you’ve got with which to defend your belief (because that’s all it is) that the gospels are somehow eye-witness narratives.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Neil … we ALL know that the bible is all he has. And this is what constantly amazes me about defenders of “the faith.” It’s a story! Part of it no doubt contains some history of the times, but to base one’s ENTIRE life on fables and tales and allegories and parables??? And then to attempt to defend them as fact??? Sheesh.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nan, I was talking history. I used Tacitus and Suetionius. Those guys are Roman historians, not Christians, and in fact, they were anti-Christians. Otherwise, I take the Bible as history unless there is some solid objective evidence not to.
(edited:N)
LikeLike
We only know this reality
In this reality there is no evidence of divinely impregnated 13 year-old Jewish girls falling pregnant.
There is neither any evidence of walking on water, instant viticulture, demons running around in pigs or dead people coming back to life.
If you can provide just a scrap of evidence then I have no doubt scientists will be all over it like a rash!
Funnily enough, this is generally what those in science and other related disciplines normally do as a matter of course when investigating claims, even the outlandish religious ones.
For this reason we now know things like the Noachian global Flood did not happen. Neither did the Exodus or Conquest.
Because of the HGP we know the tale of Adam and Eve is a physical impossibility and the tale is simply that… a tale.
Thanks to science we know the gospels are anonymous.
That Acts is unreliable being little more than historical fiction.
In fact, the more science digs into ( pun intended) the Bible tales the more it reveals it is primarily geopolitical foundation myth, and the reason people like yourself still cling to the belief that worship of a meglomaniacal, genocidal Canaanite deity named Yahweh is crucial for saving your soul is through Indoctrination, largely because of self -imposed guilt and related emotional issues.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Ark We only know this reality
No. You only acknowledge this reality. There is a difference. Every fact that calls your presupposition into question gets shoved into the box marked fiction.
Ark If you can provide just a scrap of evidence then I have no doubt scientists will be all over it like a rash!
I could argue using history that you are wrong. But the best argument for a larger reality is Jesus. Explain him without resorting to your presumption. Use history.
LikeLike
If you wish to posit other realities that’s fine, and many a science fiction writer has made a good living developing such ideas. I even have a few on my bookshelf.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Oops ..pressed send..
Suggesting other realities and providing evidence is another thing entirely.
I am confused as to what you mean by ‘explain Jesus”, could you elaborate please ?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Don:
“But we do know that minds create things out of nothing.”
Like gods…to explain things?
LikeLiked by 1 person
No. Like me and you. You did it when you replied to my comment. We create things out of nothing material simply with our minds.
We create poems and novels and histories and biology text books and we even write music purely with our minds. They end up as ink on paper or electronic bits (those are the material things) but they all originate in someone’s mind. They don’t originate with paper and ink.
Thoughts also are not the cells of our brains or the electric impulses. Those process thought and carry or store the idea; they do not create it. They are important, but they are not the idea.
Minds do that. Even animal minds do that. Beavers envision – maybe only dimly envision – dams before they build them.
So why not a mind that is not part of the material universe that it created? Why could that mind not think the universe into existence in something like the same way an author can think the world of his novel into existence on the pages of his book or an architect thinks the design for a building into existence before it is built?
Interestingly, a lot of others have begun to think that is possible. One of the current thoughts is that the universe might be a simulation, a kind of video game. Well, a simulation is something made real whether materially real or electronically real is the product of a mind.
LikeLike
Don>/b>: We create things out of nothing material simply with our minds.
I look at my screen. The image is converted to electrical signals and sent to my brain which processes the image. The lines are interpreted as letters by my brain. My brain retrieves the shapes of the Roman letters stored there and interprets them as English words. Those words are also stored in my brain which retrieves those words and translates them into concepts.
The concepts are strung together by my brain. They are compared to my memories of the comments on this article and many others from over the years. Those memories are all stored in my brain.
My brain cross references the concepts in these comments and articles to everything I’ve ever learned about Christianity, spirituality, history, science – all stored in my brain.
In an instant my brain has interpreted the words in the image my eyes see and collated thousands of pieces of information stored in my brain while discarding billions more as irrelevant.
In that instant my brain begins to form a response.
All of this happens in my very real, very physical, very material brain.
This response is not created “out of nothing.” It is created out of the electrical, chemical, and physical processes of my brain. Every scrap of scientific evidence confirms this.
If you have some evidence of thoughts existing outside of a physical brain please present it. But you won’t, because you can’t, because there isn’t any.
You’re telling ghost stories because that’s all you have. But ghosts aren’t real, Don. Time you realized that.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Kos In that instant my brain begins to form a response.
That is the interesting part, isn’t it.
No question the brain is a marvelous thing. And your description of its function is no doubt accurate. It just doesn’t explain novel ideas. It is like a computer. It responds to stimuli. But computers do not create really new things; they play with the old.
LikeLike
Don: Thoughts also are not the cells of our brains or the electric impulses. Those process thought and carry or store the idea; they do not create it. They are important, but they are not the idea.
Minds do that.
Asserted without evidence.
We have mountains of evidence for what the very physical brain does. We have machines that can test and image what’s going on in brains. Everything that has been explained about the mind has been explained as brain function.
But please, present your evidence for a mind external to the brain. I won’t hold my breath. Or even expect anything.
Religion is pulled from the Holy Ass of the religionist. And is worth less than what usually comes thence.
Don: So why not a mind that is not part of the material universe that it created? Why could that mind not think the universe into existence in something like the same way an author can think the world of his novel into existence on the pages of his book or an architect thinks the design for a building into existence before it is built?
Here’s a quick test, Don. Think some actual, material thing into existence. Say. . . a potato chip. Without a potato or oil or kettle. Hands tied behind your back. Sit at an empty table and think a potato into existence on the table in front of you. Do that reliably, repeatably, verifiably and we can talk about you god thingy further. Until then, all you have is brains (minds) have thoughts. They don’t create anything physically. They just think.
Don: Interestingly, a lot of others have begun to think that is possible.
Yes, Don, there are a lot of idiots out there. But reality isn’t determined by what people think, but what they can prove. So sit your Holy Ass in front of that table and make us a potato chip.
Don: One of the current thoughts is that the universe might be a simulation, a kind of video game. Well, a simulation is something made real whether materially real or electronically real is the product of a mind.
Bad analogy, Don. Game creators don’t seek personal relationships with their characters. They make a game for fun and profit. They milk it for all its worth while it’s profitable, then scrap it and make a new one.
If you’re a sim running in Yahweh’s computer expect to be deleted as soon as something better comes along. (The fact that this shit show hasn’t been deleted is evidence that it’s not a simulation.)
LikeLiked by 2 people
Here’s a quick test, Think some actual, material thing into existence.
That is not a good analogy. An author creates a sonnet in his mind. Now, he may speak it into existence by reciting it. But it takes pen and paper to put it on paper. An architect thinks the design for a new building in his mind. He could explain it to the person for whom he is creating it. But it takes a load of people to build it.
But it may not be that way at all. It is entirely possible that the universe is not as solidly material as we think but be simply God’s thought. The materiality of the universe may be part of the plot in the story God has created. We as characters in the story think our world is material, even though it is nothing but God’s thought. The Bible does emphasize that it was by a word that he created and it is by his word that it remains in existence.
LikeLike
Kos Bad analogy, Don. Game creators [of a computer game] don’t seek personal relationships with their characters.
They could it they wish. They could as easily write themselves into the story as any other character.
LikeLike
Kos, there are really a lot of hints throughout the Bible that something like the simulation idea is relatively consistent with the Bible.
The Bible says that this universe will pass away. It is insubstantial in that sense. The only substantial things are the eternal things.
The Bible says we exist by the word of God and that we continue to exist by his word. We have no independent existence.
The Bible says that everything of this universe was created by the will of God expressed by his word.
The Bible says that the word is eternal but that it/he became flesh. In other words, the eternal entered our temporary reality and shared our existence. That would be similar to the author of a video game writing himself into the game.
The Bible says that the Eternal One can and does interrupt the natural course of things at times. A creator of a video game can do the same.
But the Bible also implies that the course of events in most cases precede according to initial instructions and do not need the constant management of the Creator. That is true of video games as well.
All this might suggest we have no freedom to do or be anything that the author did not write into the program. But the fact is that even in video games and far more in the writing of a novel most authors will tell you that the characters take on a life of their own and end up doing things that the author did not have in mind at the beginning.
Fascinating how many similarities there are.
LikeLike
Don:
“ The sequence of chance events that had to happen for the universe to exist and be as it is exceeds probability as we commonly use the word.”
Argument from ignorance.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Don:
“So, as for a cause, a mind is far more probable than chance.”
Prove it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Don:
“History is the record of real events that have real effects”
Ghosts, goblins, gods, talking animals, resurrections, demons, etc, are NOT real events!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Don:
“How are the questions of whether there is a God or not, whether Jesus is the Son of God, whether miracles happen, whether there was a virgin birth, whether Jesus rose from the dead, etc. answered?
By history.”
By evidence.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Don:
“ So why not a mind that is not part of the material universe that it created? ”
You’re suggesting a mind without a brain?
A mind that doesn’t have physical properties?
Prove it!!!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Goyo Prove it!!!
Look around.
If you see a house, you can make a very good guess that there was an architect who designed it. If you look at the universe, it looks like it was designed. It certainly could not have been by chance.
But as for a brain, we are acquainted with brains and associate them with thinking. But that is all related to our experience in this material universe.
Brians store, sort, and process ideas but there is no reason to think ideas originate in our brains. In addition, we really do not know enough about God to say that he has no means of storing and processing ideas, just that he is not of the substance of this material universe. Must brains be material? In an alternate universe, must they be?
LikeLike
This is a really kindergarten remark — and one that believers continue to bring up when backed into a corner — It [the universe] certainly could not have been by chance.
Were you there? Are you a scientist? Do you have verifiable and/or empirical proof?
It’s a religious assumption, Don. There is NO empiric evidence on either side of the coin. Even cosmologists who spend their lives studying the topic cannot produce undeniable proof of how the universe came to be (or even if it’s always existed).
Religion likes to make multiple claims about all aspects of life, but when it comes to a topic as vast as this one, it fails utterly and completely.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Goyo I have offered the math before.
“The calculations of British mathematician Roger Penrose show that the probability of universe conducive to life occurring by chance is in 10 to 10123. The phrase “extremely unlikely” is inadequate to describe this possibility.”
To that impossibility Penrose proposed prior universes from which our universe emerged. At this point we enter the world of theoretical physics. But logic tells us that unless all universes are the same, for which there is no evidence and which would still leave us with the same probability, then probability still tells us that an unbelievable amount of chance was required.
All that is speculation at best. The thing we have to work with is this universe, and probability does not allow chance to have a part.
LikeLike
So this Penrose guy has all the inside info, right? Which would seem to indicate he’s the one to consult on all this universe thing, right? Gosh. I’m so unaware … 😵
LikeLiked by 2 people
Youn are unaware. No one is the final word, but Penrose is a very well-respected mathematician and if anyone can compute the chances, it would be him. In addition, his is an atheist. I thought you might give him more credit that it a Christian scientist were to say this.
LikeLike
From where I sit and based on my extended time on this planet, I don’t give credit to much of anything. Over the years, I’ve formed my personal outlook on life via multiple sources, resources, and experience. This isn’t to say I’m not open to new ideas or suppositions, but after awhile, one recognizes they really aren’t all that “new” but simply recycled.
Moreover, while scientists in toto tend to have an edge in their studies of us and our world and beyond, their conclusions are always debatable. It’s the nature of the (human) beast.
LikeLike
Don: … probability does not allow chance to have a part.
Tell us you are completely mathematically and scientifically illiterate please Don.
Probability is Chance.
Chance is Probability.
I’ll say it again, Don. You’ve made a god out of your ignorance.
LikeLike
Probability is math. “In science, the probability of an event is a number that indicates how likely the event is to occur.”
Chance is “something that happens unpredictably without discernible human intention or observable cause the assumed impersonal purposeless determiner of unaccountable happenings”
The science of probability tries to compute a number that describes the possibility of something happening. It was Roger Penrose who provided a measure of probability for the presumed chance events that led up to the universe and ourselves as we are. I think he is qualified to do so if anyone is.
Of course, like rolling dice, it is possible to roll two on the first roll. But it is more likely that some other number will be rolled. So, with Penrose’s calculations, it is possible for the universe to be just as it is by chance on one roll of the dice. Though actually there were multiple trillions of rolls necessary. The odds of that happening are infinitely small, however. That is why even Penrose proposes something else that he believes would reduce the odds.
LikeLike
Don:
“ Beavers envision – maybe only dimly envision – dams before they build them.”
What? And how do you know this, oh mighty knower of everything?
Beavers, like other animals, have behaviors that respond to their environment…these are called instincts. No envisioning necessary.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Don:
“we really do not know enough about God to say that he has no means of storing and processing ideas,”
Haha…you don’t know ANYTHING about god…that’s rich!
LikeLike
goyo : Haha…you don’t know ANYTHING about god…that’s rich!
This is, again, one of the many reasons I lost my faith.
Theists will go on about how God is unknowable, ineffable, His ways are above our ways, etc.
Then they turn around and tell me every detail about how God wants me to live my life. And every theist has a different list.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Don:
“Must brains be material? In an alternate universe, must they be?”
Back to Hawking again?
Where in the bible is an alternate universe talked about Don?
LikeLiked by 1 person
It all makes such logical sense … so what does that say about those who disagree with your analysis?
LikeLiked by 2 people
https://i.chzbgr.com/full/8246641152/h69BA9B9F/friends-are-friends
LikeLike
Someday I’ll figure out how to post an image the first time.
LikeLiked by 3 people
lol. Mr. Diety takes on the “It Reads Like History” argument. 🤣
LikeLiked by 2 people
Haha…that’s perfect!
Watch this Don…I’ll be interested in your opinion.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Don: The sequence of chance events that had to happen for the universe to exist and be as it is exceeds probability as we commonly use the word.
We’ve been over this, Don. The only probability that is impossible is zero. Any non-zero probability is possible. May even be probable or inevitable given the correct circumstances.
Your incredulity or mathematical illiteracy do not make something impossible or even improbable.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Don: But the best argument for a larger reality is Jesus. Explain him without resorting to your presumption. Use history.
Explain Jesus using only history? Easy.
In 1st century Palestine there were many wannabe messiahs. Jewish men who thought to gather Israel, gather an army, and throw off their Roman conquerors. These men were hunted down and crucified by the Romans.
Jesus was one of these men.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Exactly. That is exactly what the Gospels say. Except the Jewish elite had a hand in it.
LikeLike
Don: Exactly. That is exactly what the Gospels say. Except the Jewish elite had a hand in it.
No. The whole Jewish leaders and trial narrative is part of the constructed myth. The Romans didn’t need to be pushed by the Jews to crucify a failed messiah. It was policy.
LikeLike
Read Josephus. Policy sometimes gives way to politics.
LikeLike
Wondering just what part(s) of our brains do the creative stuff, I went looking on the interwebs.
And wouldn’t ya just know it? Them science boys (and gals) have them some data! Basically, our brains are capable of all the thoughty, imaginey, creativey shit that Don says has to be done outside the brain in some ghost or ghost-like appendage.
Here’s an overview of a study:
Researchers at the University of Darmouth believe they have gone one step further to discover what brain structures make us humans capable of creating works of art, inventing tools or thinking scientifically.
To find out, Peter Ulric Tse’s team wondered how the brain allows us to manipulate mental images. The results, which appear in the latest issue of “Proceedings,” involve areas that, according to a study last year in the journal “Brain”, were more developed in Einstein’s brain, like the prefrontal cortex or the parietal lobes.
To find out, they asked fifteen participants to mentally reconstruct or decompose a series of figures to form entirely new ones.
With this they tried to put into play one of our most peculiar capacities, the flexibility with which our mind can manipulate mental images and modify them. Something that happens, for example when we try to imagine, for example, a bull-headed bumblebee.
While they were carrying out tasks like these, they observed their brain using functional magnetic resonance imaging and found the activity spread throughout the cerebral cortex (the surface of the brain) and also other subcortical areas.
These active zones while mental images were manipulated coincide with a wide neural network that experts call the “working area” of the brain, of which there was no evidence until now, and which theoretically would be responsible for our conscious experiences and our own cognitive abilities of our species.
Specifically, this “working area” of the brain allows us to consciously manipulate images, symbols, ideas and theories with the concentration necessary to solve complex problems and generate new ideas.
This extensive network encompasses four main areas: the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex – where short-term memory resides – and the posterior parietal cortex – essential for executing planned movements. Together these two structures would act as an executive system that recruits other brain regions and guides behavior.
The “working area” is completed by the occipital cortex (at the back of the brain), involved in vision and also important for recreating visual experiences, and the posterior precuneus (located internally between the two cerebral hemispheres), one of the regions with greater number of connections of the cerebral cortex, which connects the three previous areas and would act as a logistic node that allows the processing of information in a conscious way.
Activity was also found in other regions, such as the cerebellum -which in addition to controlling movements, as was traditionally thought, also intervenes in attention- or the thalamus -which could play an important role in consciousness.
https://neurotray.com/what-part-of-the-brain-controls-imagination/
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ve posted before how Jesus completely fails as the Jewish messiah.
To overcome this small problem, the early Christians had to make new messianic prophecies from the Hebrew Bible to legitimize their messiah.
To show how Jesus failed, I just used the big 3 or 4 Jewish prophecies I could come up with from memory. But today, over on Daily Kos, a Jewish poster laid out the top 15 prophecies Jesus failed to fulfill. I share that post here with a link to the original.
(Apologies to Neil if this is too long a comment.)
—————————————————————————————————
Why Jesus Isn’t the Jewish Messiah
by Mark Ira Kaufman
I’ve explained Jewish messianism to Christians in person more times than I can count, and poorly at that. So in deference to my lazy nature, I decided to lay it down in a blog. That way if the subject comes up again, I can just point.
While Jesus might be the object of Christian worship, he’s got nothing to do with Jewish messianism and its prophecy – the only prophecy that matters in Judaism. The following are some Jewish messianic prophecies that render it impossible for Jesus to be Moschiah (the Hebrew word from which messiah is derived):
To start, the Messiah will descend from David, as Joseph did. (But Joseph wasn’t Jesus’ father. God supposedly was.) Scratch the first prophecy.
He will gather all the Jews back into the Land of Israel. (There are more in diaspora than in Israel.) Scratch prophecy no. 2.
The Messiah will build the Third Temple. (No third Temple yet) scratch prophecy no. 3.
He will usher in an era of peace. (If this is an era of peace, it’s a use of the word “peace” with which reasonable people are unacquainted.) Scratch prophecy no. 4.
Moschiah will father a male heir. (How many kids did Jesus have?) Scratch prophecy no. 5.
He will re-institute the Sanhedrin. (No Sanhedrin yet.) Scratch prophecy no. 6.
Many of the scriptural requirements concerning the Messiah, what he will do, and what will be done during his reign are in Isaiah. For example, [2:11-17] “The entire world will worship the One God of Israel.” (Do you see the entire world worshipping God?) Scratch prophecy no. 7.
Isaiah 11:9 says that knowledge of God will fill the world, (countless millions have no understanding of God.) Scratch prophecy no. 8.
“Death will be swallowed up forever…” [Isaiah 25:8] (The last time I checked, people are still dying each day.) So long to prophecy 9.
Isaiah 25:8 also says, “There will be no more hunger or illness.” (There’s plenty of that to go around.) Prophecy no. 10 scratched.
Isaiah 26:19 says that “All of the dead will rise again.” (Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video was only a video.) Prophecy no. 11? On hold.
Zechariah 8:23 says that the peoples of the world will turn to the Jews for spiritual guidance. (Are Christians asking the Jews anything, or telling them?) Scratch prophecy no. 12.
Ezekiel 39:9, weapons of war will be destroyed. (They’re building them as fast as possible.) No peaceful prophecy no. 13.
Jeremiah 31:33 says that the people of Israel will have direct access to the Torah through their minds and Torah study will become the study of the wisdom of the heart. (I wish…) Prophecy no. 14 shelved in favor of Jesus in the heart.
Psalms 37:4 says that God “will give you all the worthy desires of your heart.” (Who really has that…? No fulfilled prophecy there.) Prophecy no. 15 down the drain.
I could add more reasons why Jesus is no more the Jewish Messiah than I am. But my typing is atrocious, and my fingers are starting to cramp up.
And there’s nothing in the Torah, Nevi’im or Devarim — collectively the Jewsh Bible, or anywhere in Jewish messianism about a “second coming.” The Jewish Messiah is not expected to need a “do-over.”
And most important of all to Judaism, Moschiah will not be divine. He will not be God or the son of God, or any sort of entity other than as mortal as you and me. In Judaism, worshipping the messiah would be tantamount to worshipping an idol.
From the Jewish perspective, Christianity (since the Council of Nicea 1,800 years ago) has been the “Queen Mother” of cancel culture and replacement theory, validating itself by invalidating Judaism. This is no more apparent example of this than replacing Jewish messianism with Jesus.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/7/17/2181686/-Why-Jesus-Isn-t-the-Jewish-Messiah
LikeLiked by 2 people
Yes, but doncha’ know? The CHRISTIANS believe Paul and his cohorts have the “real story.” Forget all the Jewish stuff … even though their “lord and savior” was pure-blood JEW.
LikeLiked by 2 people
From the post “My Gay Demon”, Don asked Nan:
“I am interested. What prophecies are ignored and discounted?”
Here they are Don!
Wouldn’t the Jewish apologists know the Hebrew Scriptures better than the xtian apologists?
Are you going to try and refute these excellent commentaries?
Apparently you’re totally mistaken in your INTERPRETATIONS.
What do you think Don?
LikeLiked by 1 person
He’s got no answer to this one…
LikeLike
Not at all. Not when it’s so relevant.
LikeLike
Pingback: End Of Term Test – Dare to bare to the world – Shawn Rennert