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Post by Deleted on Nov 7, 2017 20:40:24 GMT -5
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Post by raybar on Nov 7, 2017 21:07:28 GMT -5
Not quite.
God sees the entirety of space-time simultaneously - everything throughout all of space and all of time. Creatures with telescopes would each have a very particular and limited view - just what they can see at the moment - and there is no way for them communicate what they see to anyone else faster than the speed of light, so they could never assemble a god-like overall view of everything.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 7, 2017 22:33:34 GMT -5
I took it a little differently as in where he wrote: And that's how I took it for his comment about humans doing it. I do admit it was an awkward way of saying it--comparing it to God, but I think the author is smart enough (from what I've read so far) that he wouldn't have overlooked the observation that you had made about the simultaneous thing as a group all at once.
For myself, it was interesting to think about each part of earth history still going on somewhere.
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Post by raybar on Nov 8, 2017 0:45:27 GMT -5
I usually see this idea mentioned in literature about astronomy and cosmology. They are constantly reminding the reader that we see things out in the universe as they were, not as they are now. So when we find signs of a technologically advanced civilization millions of light years away, they may be long extinct by now.
Television signals have been going into space for nearly a century. I think (not checking right now) that the earliest broadcast was in the late 1920s - about 90 years ago. Or maybe it was closed circuit. There are lots of stars within 90 or 80 or 70 light years, and observers at various distances could be watching TV programming from various dates right now. And wondering whether they have discovered another intelligent species. Or not.
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Post by faskew on Nov 8, 2017 8:37:49 GMT -5
Raybar - Marconi was field testing radios in 1895. Set up a permanent radio station in 1897. Weak signals, but the beginning.
Lily - I think about this often. Everything we see in space, even the very close moon, is not really there any more. It's already moved by the time we see it. Some of the stars we see have burnt out, imploded or exploded millions of years ago.
Space numbers are beyond comprehension. Our brains just can't handle things like 100 million light years. And things out there have their own laws of physic. Of course, tiny things are just as incomprehensible. Sub-atomic particles also have their own laws of physics and our brains can't deal well with them, either.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 8, 2017 17:55:55 GMT -5
Talking about distances in space always makes me think of Monty Python's Galaxy Song:
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Post by rmarks1 on Nov 8, 2017 22:35:34 GMT -5
Talking about distances in space always makes me think of Monty Python's Galaxy Song: Yes, I always loved that! Thanks for posting it. Bob
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Post by faskew on Nov 9, 2017 11:19:59 GMT -5
Of course, the Flat Earth Society and Christian evangelical fundamentalists deny that any of that nonsense is true. LOL
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Post by Deleted on Nov 9, 2017 14:23:18 GMT -5
Whatever do you mean? Here's proof! Click on image to enlarge
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Post by raybar on Nov 9, 2017 19:14:35 GMT -5
But Lily, Hawaii seems to have fallen off the edge. Here's the true earth, as described in the Bible: The Square and Stationary Earth And let's not forget our neighbors on the inside: The Hollow Earth
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Post by Deleted on Nov 9, 2017 19:33:00 GMT -5
But I still can't see Hawaii, but I guess it's just as well.
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Post by faskew on Nov 10, 2017 9:36:07 GMT -5
For Bible writers, Israel was the center of the universe. Literally. And the "earth" was completely surrounded by water. The first parts of Genesis describe how JHVH (I am what I am) also known as Elohim (the gods, plural) was walking on the chaotic waters in darkness, then he wrestled an defeated the sea monster that controlled the water. After defeating the monster, he separated the water. Some was put off to the sides (the Black Sea, the Med, etc), some was put underground, and some was put up in the air. The water in the air was held in place by something called "the firmament". It had "windows" in it to allow God to make it rain. The sun, moon and all the stars slid along inside the firmament. BTW, Genesis does not say that JHVH created the earth or the water - he found it already in place and took it away from the sea monster.
Which was all perfectly reasonable for Mesopotamians of that time. After all, there was water all around them,regardless of which direction they traveled, there was water underground, and water fell from the sky (impossible without supernatural intervention).
So maps of that time would show the Mid East as the center, with close bits Africa, Europe, India, etc., out on the fringes. Usually the earth was a circle, although one of my childhood fundamentalist friends insisted that not only was the earth flat, but it was square because somewhere in the Bible it talks about angels standing on the "four corners of the earth", and you can't have four corners without a square. 8-D
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Post by raybar on Nov 10, 2017 12:01:16 GMT -5
Every translation of Genesis into English that I have ever seen starts with "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." (Genesis 1:1, first sentence). The earth was unformed and void and God hovered over the face of the waters - - - but he had just made it all.
And the sea monsters - God created them, not defeated them, in Genesis 1:21.
Or have I missed something?
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Post by faskew on Nov 10, 2017 13:03:56 GMT -5
Yeah, you're right. My bad. Genesis does start that way. But the sea monster stuff is mostly in Psalms, Job and other books. Pretty much skipped over in Genesis. Wrestling with Leviathan is a copy of the Canaanite god Hadad fighting with Lotan, a primeval monster.
Nothing in Genesis makes any sense. If a perfect deity made the "heavens and the earth", why did he have to go back and fix everything later? Why not just make light and all the other things at the same time. And why would an omnipotent deity need to rest after 6 days? And why would an omniscient deity not see human disobedience coming before it happened? And so on and so on. Genesis mostly describes Canaanite gods and events, but with different names. And the Canaanite gods were much like the Greek gods - full of human foibles and weaknesses.
Anyway, back to maps. Ancient people weren't more stupid that modern folk - they just had fewer facts to work with. 8->
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2017 13:37:25 GMT -5
Genesis has at least two different creation stories, three if you count the contradictory passages in the first few chapters.
It's what happens when people pretend that a collection of myths and fables, compiled over nearly a thousand years by dozens of different authors, is actually a single coherent text.
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Post by faskew on Nov 10, 2017 16:12:19 GMT -5
After the Assyrians conquered the richer, more populated 10 northern tribes, its likely that many refugees went south and used their money and influence to modify the religion of the poorer, less populated southern two tribes. Which is where we probably get the two parallel versions of Genesis.
JHVH told Noah to do such-and-such. Elohim asked Noah to do such-and-such.
It was a collation of the two different sets of sacred writings, one line from one and the next line from the other. Some slight word differences, but the different name of the deity is what really stands out. I always figured that the rural, poorer southern tribes were still using Elohim (the gods) and it was the more advanced northern folk who introduced the Canaanite god, JHVH. Just my opinion. 8->
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Post by Deleted on Nov 14, 2017 19:37:13 GMT -5
Most of the actual writings postdate the Babylonian Exile though, well after the Assyrian conquest. So it's difficult to tell where either or both stories really come from.
The Hebrew flood myth is almost certainly cribbed from ancient Babylonian or Sumerian sources, though.
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Post by faskew on Nov 15, 2017 11:06:09 GMT -5
From my readings it appears that there were two different sets of scrolls merged after the Assyrian conquest, then the priests did a "final" version after they returned from Babylonian exile. As you say, all we really know about the earliest writings is that they were heavily influenced by the dominate Mesopotamian culture of that time.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 16, 2017 4:17:38 GMT -5
I feel bad about this, because I never meant for this thread to be about religion. And if you all think it's all about religion than maybe it was Evil that created this world and not God. And maybe it is God that is trying to halt Evil? Would't that explain a lot about evil in the world?
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Post by faskew on Nov 16, 2017 9:35:03 GMT -5
That's exactly the view of the early Christian sect called "Gnostics". When non-Jews became Christians, they were struck by how different the god of the OT was from the god of the NT. Christian Jews of the time didn't have this problem, but the Greek and Roman converts did. So somebody started the idea that the world was created by an evil god (god of the OT) and the purpose of Jesus was to pass that knowledge on to people so that they could "turn to the light" and get away from the evil god.
Gnosticism was a major player in the early days, and many surviving writings of the early church fathers were nothing but attempts to refute it. Even some of the changes made in the NT were to remove or clarify text that the Gnostics were using to prove their belief.
Eventually, Christianity decided that all the bad things on earth are the result of the Garden of Eden. Everything is the sky is perfect and pure and everything down here is corrupt and sinful. But Real Soon Now, God will come, destroy all the bad people, and make a new heaven on earth. Just hang on.
Anyway, you should check out Gnosticism on Wikipedia or somewhere. It may be the one for you. 8->
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Post by Deleted on Nov 16, 2017 12:06:38 GMT -5
That makes much more sense to me than there's evil because we have free will. I'll check it out.
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Post by faskew on Nov 16, 2017 17:01:24 GMT -5
No one ever brings up the fact that an omniscient deity would know that Adam and Eve were going to eat the forbidden fruit before they did it. But then to act angry and curse all living things to death (there was no death before the fall), that's just psychotic. LOL
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Post by Deleted on Nov 16, 2017 18:52:59 GMT -5
No one ever brings up the fact that an omniscient deity would know that Adam and Eve were going to eat the forbidden fruit before they did it. But then to act angry and curse all living things to death (there was no death before the fall), that's just psychotic. LOL Yeah, and guess who got blamed. Proves it was a male who wrote that. Of course, if God really did dictate the Bible, it proves that he's a male. Maybe God is married and was hen-pecked and was only going to curse Eve, but the wife wouldn't hear of it.
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Post by raybar on Nov 16, 2017 19:39:02 GMT -5
. . . an omniscient deity would know that Adam and Eve were going to eat the forbidden fruit before they did it . . . It's worse than that, Fred. - God put Adam and Eve into the Garden in a state of complete ignorance - I mean innocence - and imposed a commandment on them. - God also put the serpent, the most cunning of all creatures, into the Garden. - The serpent got Adam and Eve to break the commandment. So God matched the innocent against the cunning, and the innocent were led astray. There was no other possible outcome. This story is mythology, and was not meant this way when written, but a modern reader might call it entrapment.
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Post by faskew on Nov 17, 2017 8:47:28 GMT -5
It's like a Kipling "just so" story. Another point not talked about is that Adam and Eve did not know "good from evil" until they ate the fruit. At that time, they first realized that they were naked, became ashamed and covered themselves with leaves. In other words, they didn't know not to do wrong until after they had done wrong. And when God kicks them out, he tells the angels that there is a "tree of life" in the Garden and if they eat of that, they will become immortal, so he's kicking them out before they get to that one. It's a primitive story and childish. It was almost certainly an oral tradition passed around for centuries before it was written down. Also related to standard Mesopotamian beliefs of the time, in which the gods make humans to do work for them and the humans become disobedient and are punished. (Adam was created to be the gardener. He had a specific job.)
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Post by raybar on Nov 17, 2017 11:39:08 GMT -5
Right. The "innocence" included not knowing about good or evil or clothing. So when the serpent came along, Eve believed what it said which, by the way, was true: they did not die when they ate the forbidden fruit, as God had said they would. Which is to say, God is a liar.
But mythology is not supposed to make sense in a scientific way. The Garden story explains how we came to be and why life is so difficult. The "birds of the field" find all they need without working for it, but man has to grow crops and tend livestock and build houses and so on. What the authors of such stories didn't realize is that their own hunter-gatherer ancestors didn't work for a living either, not until they started depending on agriculture which made large populations possible, but at the cost of endless toil in the fields.
The oldest extant writing is only 5 or 6 thousand years old, whereas modern humans appeared 100,000 to 200,000 years ago. So I think it's a safe bet that most or all ancient mythology began as oral traditions deep in prehistory.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 18, 2017 14:59:10 GMT -5
Raybar wrote:
And also led to slavery and mistreatment of animals and eventually factory farms, and disease for humans. Read Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari to learn more.
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Post by raybar on Nov 18, 2017 17:20:50 GMT -5
I think I've read "Sapiens . . ." I can't find it at the moment, but I sold and donated a lot of books over the last several years.
Yes, the development of agriculture led to some unfortunate results, but it allowed the development of nearly everything we have beyond fire and stone tools. I would not want to abandon modern civilization and go back to hunting and gathering.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 18, 2017 18:01:04 GMT -5
I don't think you would have to abandon anything just because the chances are most of us wouldn't be here. No population explosion, either. Would that be such a bad thing?
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