To abstract or not to abstract

[joigus]

2 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

That was a reinstatement a few generations before Babylon toppled them.  David instituted the first unified place of worship in Jerusalem 14 generations prior to Babylon.

Archaeological evidence proves to the contrary. 900 BCE Jerusalem was a small town, as proven by Israel Finkelstein. The perimeter is well established by the old tombs and the dating of the pottery is ambiguous at best. The gates of Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer, rebuilt by Solomon according to the Bible, are not Solomonic at all. They are probably Iron Age.

In the time of David the kingdoms of Israel and Judah were two independent kingdoms.

Monumental architecture of the time corresponds to king Omri of Israel, not to Judah. Masonry signatures testify to that.

Just after king Josiah accesses the throne of Judah, local temples disappear and Jerusalem stands alone. 

Careful studies of the archaeology of the countryside have proven that the population wasn't enough for an army. There is no trace of scribal activity or pottery bearing the seal of the king in the Davidic kingdom. We know there was a chieftain named David because of the Tel-Dan stele.But his presence was very thin on the ground.

We know Omri was the big king of the time because of the Mesha stele. Also the only to boast monumental architecture in Samaria, as well as abundant excavated luxury goods.

3 hours ago, John Cuthber said:

Ruins this joke
https://imgflip.com/i/wa6ee

LOL. It hasn't for me.

3 hours ago, John Cuthber said:

Archaeology is science, but the dead sea scrolls are hearsay. Science can't even tell us that Mary was real.

Yes, I was referring to the archaeology of the written hearsay. Of course material culture and inconsistencies between the Bible and what's been unearthed are most important.

[Bartholomew Jones]

3 hours ago, John Cuthber said:

And, from time to time, the "laws" get overturned as Relativity did with Newtonian physics.
Which is why science has the sense to say that (outside of maths) nothing gets proved. It may be that we simply haven't done a clever enough experiment yet.
The law has similar  understanding, whence the phrase "beyond reasonable doubt".

The law yet requires truth, excluding nothing that might be recommended as evidence by either party if it duly bears on the relative issues.  Excluding any class of information if it has bearing is a form prejudice/bias, in law, in science or otherwise.  All just information offered is considered in the burden proving, for example, guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.  Excluding anecdotes if redundant is fair, if several is not fair; If collectively unified, is malformed.

[iNow]

13 minutes ago, joigus said:

Archaeological evidence proves to the contrary. 900 BCE Jerusalem was a small town, as proven by...

It’s only fair that I pushback on you like I did on Bart. The evidence suggests these things beyond a reasonable doubt, but doesn’t “prove” them per se. 

4 minutes ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

All just information offered is considered in the burden proving, for example, guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. 

Beyond reasonable doubt. Much like so much of science. Amazing that you accept these concepts in terms of law, but reject them in context of science. 

[Bartholomew Jones]

3 hours ago, studiot said:

In technical terms  'Theory'

may include several 'Principles', which are the scientific equivalent of mathematical proofs.
An axiom or principle is a statement offered without proof but in the knowledge that it is not known to be contradicted within the conditions of application.

A mathematical proof must define an equality, a truth.  So then what are the conditions of application that warranted dismissal of a deity, (it does relate preeminently), as what was axiom when science was practiced as ancient philosophy?

Edited December 18, 2020 by Bartholomew Jones

[studiot]

10 minutes ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

A mathematical proof must define an equality, a truth.

Please don't try to tell a Mathematicain what a mathematical theorem or its proof is.

Probably the most famous counterexample (do you know and understand this word ?) is "The triangle inequality"  which is, by definition, not an equality and was known before Euclid.

FYI there are many uses of such mathematical structures in Physcs, for instance the Second Law and The Uncertainty Principle.

Edited December 18, 2020 by studiot

[Bartholomew Jones]

4 hours ago, studiot said:

But my point to you is that, once again your approach is an all-or-nothing (binary) approach to something which has a scale from good to bad or black to white with many many shades of grey in between.

It could be, it should be; it isn't.  Science is an institution; beyond that of a school, such as like it was.  It caters to modern commerce, which is consumptive, not productive, to the earth and the things earth produces freely.  At the end of all our production we've produced waste that hurts.

It's about debits and credits, where posterity suffers.  If the earth is left in disrepair, posterity pays with blood, sweat and tears.

[Bartholomew Jones]

6 hours ago, iNow said:

I’m no Strange, but happy to oblige 

 

Not fair!

3 hours ago, iNow said:

It’s only fair that I pushback on you like I did on Bart. The evidence suggests these things beyond a reasonable doubt, but doesn’t “prove” them per se. 

Beyond reasonable doubt. Much like so much of science. Amazing that you accept these concepts in terms of law, but reject them in context of science. 

My point is that science, for example, rejects as evidence the entire unified testimony of the church called Christian, which always has a strong bearing against views science holds as principles.

Edited December 18, 2020 by Bartholomew Jones

[studiot]

2 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

  It caters to modern commerce, which is consumptive, not productive, to the earth and the things earth produces freely.  At the end of all our production we've produced waste that hurts.

 

Is this another attempt to bash mass production  ?

Suppose you wanted (to build) a house.

Would you make all the bricks individually one at a time or would you think mass production might be advantageous ?

Furthermore would you follow the brickmaking instructions in your Bible when you made them ?

Edited December 18, 2020 by studiot

[joigus]

4 hours ago, iNow said:

It’s only fair that I pushback on you like I did on Bart. The evidence suggests these things beyond a reasonable doubt, but doesn’t “prove” them per se.

@iNow. Fair enough. "Beyond a reasonable doubt" actually sounds more like me.

 

[Bartholomew Jones]

25 minutes ago, studiot said:

 

Is this another attempt to bash mass production  ?

Suppose you wanted (to build) a house.

Would you make all the bricks individually one at a time or would you think mass production might be advantageous ?

Furthermore would you follow the brickmaking instructions in your Bible when you made them ?

The Bible actually frowns on bricks.

A mansion proper is built from earth.

4 hours ago, studiot said:

Please don't try to tell a Mathematicain what a mathematical theorem or its proof is.

Probably the most famous counterexample (do you know and understand this word ?) is "The triangle inequality"  which is, by definition, not an equality and was known before Euclid.

FYI there are many uses of such mathematical structures in Physcs, for instance the Second Law and The Uncertainty Principle.

Okay.  But fundamentally isn't an inequality a negative equality.  For example, if the thing is false, that's the truth: that the thing is false.  If it's not equal, not, is negative.

Edited December 18, 2020 by Bartholomew Jones

[joigus]

20 hours ago, iNow said:

Anyway, WTF does Jesus have to do with isolating kefir bacteria? You really jump around with your thoughts. It’s like playing whack-a-mole sometimes with you. 

You've got to admit that Christopher Hitchens was spot on when he said "with religious types you never know what you're gonna hear next."  

[iNow]

2 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

My point is that science, for example, rejects as evidence the entire unified testimony of the church called Christian

Evidence of what?

[studiot]

2 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

The Bible actually frowns on bricks.

A mansion proper is built from earth.

 

 

Quote

Exodus

⁶ That same day Pharaoh gave this order to the slave drivers and overseers in charge of the people: ⁷ “You are no longer to supply the people with straw for making bricks; let them go and gather their own straw. ⁸ But require them to make the same number of bricks as before; don’t reduce the quota. They are lazy; that is why they are crying out, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’ ⁹ Make the work harder for the people so that they keep working and pay no attention to lies.”

¹⁰ Then the slave drivers and the overseers went out and said to the people, “This is what Pharaoh says: ‘I will not give you any more straw. ¹¹ Go and get your own straw wherever you can find it, but your work will not be reduced at all.’” ¹² So the people scattered all over Egypt to gather stubble to use for straw. ¹³ The slave drivers kept pressing them, saying, “Complete the work required of you for each day, just as when you had straw.” ¹⁴ And Pharaoh’s slave drivers beat the Israelite overseers they had appointed, demanding, “Why haven’t you met your quota of bricks yesterday or today, as before?”

¹⁵ Then the Israelite overseers went and appealed to Pharaoh: “Why have you treated your servants this way? ¹⁶ Your servants are given no straw, yet we are told, ‘Make bricks!’ Your servants are being beaten, but the fault is with your own people.”

¹⁷ Pharaoh said, “Lazy, that’s what you are—lazy! That is why you keep saying, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to the Lord.’ ¹⁸ Now get to work. You will not be given any straw, yet you must produce your full quota of bricks.”

 

Your own Bible gives the lie to that statement.

Seems to me a pretty clear record of antisocial behaviour by the leaders gangsters? of the day.

 

2 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

Okay.  But fundamentally isn't an inequality a negative equality.  For example, if the thing is false, that's the truth: that the thing is false.  If it's not equal, not, is negative.

 

So you do want to tell a Mathematician what an equality is.

Wow and goodbye.

Edited December 19, 2020 by studiot

[Bartholomew Jones]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

Evidence of what?

The testimony of the created order, and, the generations of the heavens and of the earth.

1 hour ago, studiot said:

So you do want to tell a Mathematician what an equality is.

Wow and goodbye.

If a soul thinks he shouldn't ever be questioned he thinks too highly of himself.

Wisdom asks for judgment.

Your office doesn't make you someone.  Your office is your duty.

You ought to take pride that God made you in his image.

Edited December 19, 2020 by Bartholomew Jones

[iNow]

38 minutes ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

The testimony of the created order, and, the generations of the heavens and of the earth

The assertion that some magic cloud surfer who cares whether you masturbate or eat burgers on Fridays created the entire universe is an extraordinary claim. It consequently requires extraordinary evidence to support it, especially since it’s not required to explain what we see.

Saying “goddidit” offers no value or explanatory power whatsoever  

Since eyewitness testimony is barely good enough in the courts to convict criminals of petty crimes, why do you believe it should good enough for science to accept the god hypothesis as true?

Do you allow eye witness testimony to change your mind when others use it to defend their gods, gods which are different from yours? If I shared eye witness testimony that I saw the Flying Spaghetti Monster, surely you’re smart enough to realize my claim is likely false. 

Some of us just go one god farther and include yours in that set. 

[Markus Hanke]

10 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

Not fair!

Peer review is not meant to be “fair” (what does that even mean?) - on the contrary, it is designed to be as critical as possible, so as to really put the ideas within the publication to a rigorous test. It is the most effective way to tease out any problems; remember, you want to end up with something that actually works, in the sense of the scientific method.

10 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

My point is that science, for example, rejects as evidence the entire unified testimony of the church called Christian, which always has a strong bearing against views science holds as principles.

You are missing the salient point. Science has nothing at all to say as to the existence or supposed characteristics of anything that isn’t part of nature, including any and all notions of deities. This is quite simply outside the domain of applicability of science, because the very notion of “God” is not amenable to the scientific method. So science neither rejects nor endorses the Christian faith, because it deals with a different domain of enquiry.

However - and this is the important point - if someone proclaims an element of their faith as being objective truth, then this claim will of course be challenged by science. Some such claims may turn out to be compatible with scientific evidence, so they are fine; others may not be, and those will be rejected. To give a simple example - if someone claims, based on certain readings of the Bible, that the Earth is ~6000 years old, then science will certainly reject this, because that claim is evidently false based on all available scientific data. 

So the issue isn’t faith and belief - the issue is only when people try to misrepresent their beliefs as objective, scientific facts. That’s what’s called a category mistake, and it will always be challenged.

[joigus]

19 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

El, was used as axiom in all very early time periods universally to convey the notion of a god or of gods or of the Hebrew God.  By the third generation of men stemming from Adam through Seth to Enosh, "men began to call on the name of the LORD (translated in all caps means the name YHWH)."  Genesis 4:26.  That's the historical first use.  The first use in Scripture is Genesis 2:4, coupled with el, "the LORD God," or, el Yah(weh).

OK, the fact that you mention Adam and his immediate offspring as factual is enough for me to know this discussion is not leading anywhere useful.

Some biblical myths are inclusions from Babylon. Ezra re-edited the Torah, because it had been lost after Nebuchadnezzar II destroyed the Second Temple. The myth of the flood from the Epic of Gilgamesh is very recognizable. Another one is the story of a man whose wife cannot conceive, so that they arrange that it is the slave who is going to play that role --Abraham--. The latter story is foreshadowed in the Nuzi tablets over and over, and over again. Also in Mari --Mesopotamia. It is more than likely that they picked it up by the rivers of Babylon, because they came to know it was a common Babylonian story.

Also you say all deities in the Bible stand for God. We already know this cannot be true -beyond any reasonable doubt.

There are also inscriptions speaking of Yahweh and his Ashera (his wife). The existence of a pantheon of gods is very clear in the archaeological record. Baal is not, as you seem to suggest, another representation of Yahweh, but the bull god that appears in many places of the Middle East and features prominently in Exodus, different in name and in the statuettes --in the human form, El, sitting and serene; while Baal, aggressive, in smiting position, and using his strength. It's Baal-Zebub, the Lord of the Flies, that in Christian iconography became to be known as Satan. Yahweh, in the Sinaitic depictions, looks nothing like El. Why would he? They are different gods from different regions.

Are you going to believe what a book which was copied again and again, recompiled hundreds of years later after its partial destruction, probably recited at some points; 

or are you going to believe the fragments of script that are dug from the ground and tell us what the Canaanites of that time probably believed?

Faith-based religion is not like a message passed down in its pristine form generation after generation; it is more like a game of Chinese whispers played throughout the centuries in which you never know what the message is going to become. That much we already know beyond any reasonable doubt. Understanding the process, rather than the details, makes it very easy to see how you can throw in a new element and make it part of the broth, keeping some words but changing the meaning, etc. Like your kefir. It is the lack of logical strictures which allows to do that.

19 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

Though written originally in Greek they were conveying Hebrew thought in Greek terms.  The Hebrew term was used interchangeably to convey a virgin, defacto, or a young woman.

This appears not to be true:

https://weareisrael.org/spiritual-seed-2/male-child/betulah-vs-almah/

Quote

The Hebrew word עלמה (al-mah’) is often erroneously translated as “virgin.” A betulah’ (virgin) can be an al-mah (young sexually mature woman) and vice versa; but these two words are not synonymous! A betulah’ is not necessarily a young woman and a young woman is not necessarily a virgin.

We have already read that Rebekah was a virgin (בתולה, betulah) who had not known a man.

“Now the girl [Rebekah] was very beautiful to behold, a virgin [בתולה, betulah]; no man had known her; and she went down to the well, filled her pitcher, and came up.” (Gen_24:16)

But, when Eliezer recalls his story to Rebekah’s father (Bethuel), he calls Rebekah a young woman  (עלמה, al-mah’), a sexually mature woman at the prime age for work, because he was not privy to her actual sexual status.

18 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

Again, the original text was in Greek because Hebrews in Roman time only wrote in Greek, like the rest of the world.  They were conveying Hebrew thoughts in Greek.

No, the plot makes very clear Mary and Joseph had not come together and that she was confirmed to Joseph as not having been with a man.  Also she states she had not been with a man

Helenization of Roman Jews started in the 4th century BCE, but found strong resistance that culminated in the Maccabean revolt during the Seleucid rule. So they were not completely Helenized, especially considering the Maccabeans were successful, unlike the rebels of Masada. It was after the diaspora that most transcriptions of Torah appear only in Greek, at least in Europe. But the sect of Qumran still copied the Bible in Hebrew, and I'm sure the rebels of Masada also did so, at the time of the Jewish revolt.

Some of the parchments have been found to appear to have been dropped on the ground of the caves in Qumran as the legions came to arrest them. Those texts range from old copies to contemporary copies --at the time. They are all in Hebrew.

Edited December 19, 2020 by joigus

[joigus]

19 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

No such thing as excellence in persecution.  That's like excellence in crime or in malpractice.

"Par excellence" after a noun meaning "a very good example of something":

https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/par-excellence_1?q=par+excellence

No excellence implied in the literal sense.

[Bartholomew Jones]

6 hours ago, Markus Hanke said:

16 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

Not fair!

Peer review is not meant to be “fair” (what does that even mean?) -

I was kidding, with the comic, not the context.

6 hours ago, Markus Hanke said:

You are missing the salient point. Science has nothing at all to say as to the existence or supposed characteristics of anything that isn’t part of nature, including any and all notions of deities..

But the Bible doesn't suggest that God is not of nature.  There are errors in the church, including the notion of supernatural.

[John Cuthber]

17 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

The Bible actually frowns on bricks.

A mansion proper is built from earth.

What do you think bricks are made from?

 

18 hours ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

My point is that science, for example, rejects as evidence the entire unified testimony of the church called Christian, which always has a strong bearing against views science holds as principles.

Science and the law both reject hearsay; for the same reasons.

 

[Bartholomew Jones]

3 hours ago, John Cuthber said:

What do you think bricks are made from?

If you you read the Bible through with due care you see God's people becoming mere men; then you see God's people becoming mere men.  Then you see God's people becoming mere men.

All the while he sends servants, saying, 16Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein.  --Jeremiah 6:16

Also: 24An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings, and thy peace offerings, thy sheep, and thine oxen: in all places where I record my name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee. 25And if thou wilt make me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone: for if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it. 26Neither shalt thou go up by steps unto mine altar, that thy nakedness be not discovered thereon.

Compare "shalt," against "wilt," in 24 and 25.

--Exodus 20:24-26

For brick, see the Tower of Babel.

 

[John Cuthber]

6 minutes ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

For brick

You failed to answer  the question.

[Bartholomew Jones]

2 minutes ago, John Cuthber said:

You failed to answer  the question.

Of human hands is brick made, against nature, of nature's materials.  See the Tower of Babel.

[John Cuthber]

1 minute ago, Bartholomew Jones said:

Of human hands is brick made, against nature, of nature's materials.  See the Tower of Babel.

The correct answer is clay- a form of earth.

Thanks for a nice clear example of your Bible being wrong.

One example is enough. Please don't bother to provide any more.
 

[Bartholomew Jones]

10 minutes ago, John Cuthber said:

The correct answer is clay- a form of earth.

Thanks for a nice clear example of your Bible being wrong.

One example is enough. Please don't bother to provide any more.
 

A proverb: "Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will be like him.  Answer a fool according to his folly, or he will be wise in his own eyes."

Brick is made of mixtures of earth's materials.