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@Mopac
it's not at all surprising Matthew used the LXX - indeed it is very possible he would have been unable to read the Hebrew original. The slip from 'woman' to 'virgin' was a translation error by the scholars who wrote the LXX and Matthew may not have been aware it was an error.
Matthew's contribution was to apply Isaiah's prophesy to Jesus. in short, in Isaiah 7 Isaiah tells the Hebrew king Ahaz that his enemies will soon be laid waste. More precisely, that will occur before the son of an unspecified woman is fully weaned. The point is that the event will be soon - Isaiah is prophesying about the near-future, not 600 years hence.
There is nothing in the text to imply that the woman is currently a virgin or that she will remain one! If that had been Isaiah's intent he could have used 'Bethulah' not 'Almah'. The use of an impending (normal) birth to imply soonness appears again in Isaiah 8.
Isiah 8:3 Then I made love to the prophetess, and she conceived and gave birth to a son. And the Lord said to me, “Name him Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz. 4 For before the boy knows how to say ‘My father’ or ‘My mother,’ the wealth of Damascus and the plunder of Samaria will be carried off by the king of Assyria.”
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@Mopac
The septuigate is written in Greek, of course, but Jews didn't have a problem using it for hundreds of years.
Quite opposite - a translation to greek was needed because in between the testaments Jews (along with most of the mediterranan region) had come under greek inluence and the Hebrew language had all but died out - the jews of jesus time spoke greek, not hebrew.
Famously matthew copied isiah 7:14 from the Septuagint rather than translating Isiah's hebrew original thus transforming the mother of jesus from a 'woman' into a 'virgin'.
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@Analgesic.Spectre
AFAIK regular biologists treat them seperately so so all current humans are one subspecies with race as the next even finer-grained filter.
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@ethang5
May one suspect that the "brides" had very little choice in the matter?
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i don't think there are 'plenty'.
but there are good reasons to doubt the bible's account of a Hebrew golden age under David and Solomon apart from an "argument from silence".
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It's a little confusing because you wrote;
A case for the existence of human races is best made by answering two questions:
(1) is there sufficient variation within humans for there to be subspecies?
(2) if so, is there sufficient variation to sort data into discrete subspecies?
Are you saying that 'race and 'subspecies' are synonyms?
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@secularmerlin
They are all 'real'. I assume you mean 'original', which is not problematic assuming you bother to keep track because the way you've set it up (using a replicator) there is 'physical continuity' between 1 of the 7 and the original.
I suppose for most scenarios thephysically continuous one would be considered the 'real' one, but as i said they are all physicaly real so the 'physically continous' entity is only a sort of 'legal successor'. As in my royal titles example you could make the rule to say its the last copy made that is the 'legal successor' so although 'physically contiupus' seems definite and objective using that criterion it as the criterion for 'realness' is an arbitrary choice.
If the original is destroyed then no surviving entity is physically continous. As all entites are equivalent in all regards it ts obvious any rule for detmining 'realness' must be arbitrary.
Do you agree or do you think there is an objective reason to privilege physical continuity?
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@secularmerlin
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So there is a debate, then there is debate about each vote on that debate to decide it it counts as a vote on the original debate then a debate about the decision to count (or not count) the vote on the debate (the first, original debate that is). Then there is also this curent debate about the process of debating and counting and not counting votes, and debating the debate about counting votes to be debated.
It couldn't be simpler.
I'll stick to the forums.
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@secularmerlin
Well I think you're trying to evade the issue I want to debate, but I'd say it depends on why you want to make the determination. You could do it using the same basis the oldest son inherits a royal title - ie you make up an arbitrary rule. The rule for inheriting royal titles could be that the middle daughter gets it, but it isn't - at least not on earth; it is on Rigel 7.
So step a) determine why want to identify only one clone as privileged.
step b)invent a rule to achieve the goal of a).
I can imagine suddenly having 7 husbands would be a logistical challenge to mrs secularmerlin, but there is no paradox involved to make such menages-a-huit logically impossible.
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@Stronn
Stronn wrote:..then scripture is wrong.
Kill Stronn the blasphemer!
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@secularmerlin
ah, but that isn't what happens in a normal teleport! If its all the same to you I'd like to return to that later and stick ot whether the 'you' after teleporting is the 'you' before teleporting (assuming all goes well).
One test would be to see if Mrs SecularMerlin could tell if you had teleported home or come by plane after a business trip.
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@Plisken
i spent a dull 10 minutes going through that thread. Nobody tried to convince grug that god exists.
nor was there even 1 attack on God per se, except i suppose any remark not fully proclaiming his awesome majesty is an 'attack' in some people's eyes!
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What makes the operations of a working computer meaningful? It is probable that they are without meaning to the computer which presumably does not make value judgements.
I mean the working of a computer running a program can be analysed by us at a high-level or at a low-level. That does not apply to a broken motherboard that can't run a program - it's activity only has low-level analysis. A computer does not analyse its own operation even when it is working! (it can if so programmed, but it is not essential for a computer to be self-aware!). i'm talking about how you could describe what the computer is doing to some body else at 'high' or 'low' level.
drafterman said "One's a soulless automaton" in relation to the riker 'clone' (which one i am not sure!) but i would say both of them can analysed at high or low level.
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@secularmerlin
What is the difference between a broken computer and a working one? A not-completely dead computer may have activity going on, but it's meaningless activity b- it doesn't support the 'high level' of analysis I refrered to. A defunct computer may still (possibly) be shifting numbers around its registers, but its not making monsters and weapons.
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@secularmerlin
I think what a journal lacks is dynamism. Such a journal would be like the source code of a progam - inert in itself, being only the 'recipe' of the actual self.Does that mean that a complete enough journal is the same thing as the human that wrote it?
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@drafterman
it depends on the level of analysis. An X-box game can be thought of in terms of monsters and weapons but underneath it is numbers being moved in and out of registers by a microchip. At one level the brain manifests a self, at a different level it's the synaptic communiction.of neurons. In each case both levels are correct - it is question of which is the more useful image in context.
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@secularmerlin
If the brain in is manifesting thesort of activitythat constites self then i suppose it should, but
not all activity would count as meaningful. Occasional random synapses firing wouldnot be 'self ptroducing') at least that is my guess.
the other side is that a brain is not neccessary - any structure that can support the correct pattern of activity (such as 'brain' made of artificial silion 'neirons')would suffice.
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@secularmerlin
That is becoming your trademark answer on DA!
I'm not asking you to accept it - I'm bouncing an idea off you to see if between us all we can find out whas self is.
.
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@3RU7AL
Narrativium contamnation, probably in the flux converter.
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@secularmerlin
The point is that characters in Star Trek clearly don't think of teleporting as cloning but as means a transport. It is 'beam me up,Scotty', not 'create a clone of me,Scotty'. In the Star Trek universe the answer to 'is post-teleport Spock the same person as pre-teleport Spock?' is unquivocally 'yes' (malfunctions aside!).
(btw didn't we discuss what 'person' meant before?)
Contrary to earlier posts, I think that indicates a very monist, materialist and non-Dualist philosophy applies , and I think it also applies in our universe.
I think the self is not made of neurons per se but by the pattern of their interactions. Neurons are the dancers, but self is the dance, less floridly, self is pattern and pattern is non-material - it is information.
Information is the only stuff that can copied perfectly. So what the teleporter must be doing is ensuring the pattern of neural activity in th e 'copy' is the same as in the 'original'. If you accept the idea at the self is neural activity and nothing else (ie monist materialism) I can se no philosphical obection to teleporting.
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Absolute truth, Ultimate truth, big-T 'Truth' and little-t 'truth'... I feel like Pilate!
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@secularmerlin
That sounds rather an emotional reason! Many anti-teleporters go as far as wanting to ban the technology as death machines -do you go that far?
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@drafterman
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@ethang5
What if we deport a criminal from, say, New York to Chicago? They're futher apart than London and Paris.
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@secularmerlin
OK - Can you be specific about why you are against telporting?
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@secularmerlin
Really I only wanted to use teleporting as a framework for a philosophical debate on the self. What ever the technical obections, they seem to have been all worked out on the Enterprise and people happily beam up and beam down.... even Bones is more concerned with malfunctions than the underlying philosophy.
I've a few very lively threads on other forums between pro and anti- teleporters, but perhaps DArt doesn't find it as interesting.as I do!
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@janesix
Me neither, but what I posted was to contradict Grugore who (tried to) mock atheists by saying they attack what does not exisI.
I say to that
"Atheists attack belief in something that does not exist, not something that does not exist'
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@janesix
You don't know what beliefs are wrong, and which are right. You have no idea.
Is it just me who has no idea, or is there a poster on DArt who does "know what beliefs are wrong, and which are right"?
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@disgusted
There is a problem that not many records rom that time still exist. The bible is exceptional because it was continually copied, but the oldest complete OT is from the 10th century AD!
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@Grugore
I am sure any Muslim or Hindu who posted on DArt would ave their beliefs attacked. Why attack theism? Because it is wrong, and because it wrong it can lead to absurd conclusions, sucg as rejectint legitimate science and claims that homosexuality is satanic! Parts of the Islamic world show what can happen when people take their superstition too seriously.
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@Grugore
BTW, these are the same people who attack something they believe doesn't exist. Even more irony.
Atheists attack belief in something that does not exist.
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You miss the most important step which is to define 'subspecies'. Once we have a definition it is trivial to see if humans have subspecies or not. The problem is coming up with a definition that a) doesn't pre-judge what you want b) gets widespread acceptance from biologists.
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@PGA2.0
OK, instead of 'good' and 'evil' consider 'smallness' and 'bigness'. Smallness is an attribute of mice, bigness is an attribute of elephants. If bigness was a thing then you could buy some 'bigness' on e-bay and add it to a mouseand turn it into an elephant. you can't rally do that because smallness and bigness are gramatically nouns, but there are no such thing as 'smallness'and no such thing as 'bigness'.
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@secularmerlin
<tongue-in-cheek>
In order for each particle in the copy to have the correct position and velocity it is necessary to measure the position and velocity of each source particles with very high precision.
Because of the Heisenberg Uncertainly Principle, measurement to the required position effectively randomises the subsequent positions and velocities of each source particle - hence the source particles become distributed across a vast region of space all moving independently. Thus teleporting allows for 1 and only one faithful copy. Multiple copies are possible only by reducing the fidelity of the copy. It is sometimes said that you can teleport Snow White and get either one Snow White or 7 dwarves.
</tongue-in-cheek>
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Whether souls survive death I doubt, but the writers of the OT didn't think so and the Sadducees rejected the resurrection of dead in the time of jesus (Acts 23:8 - "For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection").
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@Fallaneze
i see I could have been clearer.
The neronal circuit I refer to will have arisen by Darwian evolution so 'cost' and 'benefit' relate to Darwinian fitness. I am not suggsting the ciruot can accurately calculate fitness, but a billion years of nutural selection means it makes very good esttimates of what will increase or decrease fitness in most circumstances, although it is perfectly possible it it makes mistakes occasionally!
As it is a 'neural net' rather than an algorithm we can expect variaion between individuals. I hope that helps! The take away is that 'morality' based on a brain process, not on metaphysical fictions such as 'good' and 'evil'.
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i see I could have been clearer.
The neronal circuit I refer to will have arisen by Darwian evolution so 'cost' and 'benefit' relate to Darwinian fitness. I am not suggsting the ciruot can accurately calculate fitness, but a billion years of nutural selection means it makes very good esttimates of what will increase or decrease fitness in most circumstances, although it is perfectly possible it it makes mistakes occasionally!
As it is a 'neural net' rather than an algorithm we can expect variaion between individuals. I hope that helps! The take away is that 'morality' based on a brain process, not on metaphysical fictions such as 'good' and 'evil'.
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@ethang5
I think he's terrible at making what ever point he is trying to make but very good at blaming other people for his problem in expressing himself.
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Ethang wrote:The NT is saying do not make earthly wealth your hearts desire, not that wealth is bad
I think the NT does go further than saying 'do not make earthly wealth your hearts desire' and does imply 'wealth is bad'.
Perhaps the most explicit passage is
"I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked, “Who then can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Matthew 19:23-26
There are other verses that express similar ideas, and I don't know of anything that can be construed as otherwise.
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I invite you to tell me why you attribute to a non-existent being the evil in the world? Such thinking does not make sense.
You are right it doesn't make sense - so why do you think that i think that way? You are not the only person with sense!
There is no such thing as evil. There are things that are evil but that isn't the same thing. Evil is an adjective, not a noun.
Consider a smallpox germ - why does it exist? There is no reason; but if DNA gets together in such away that it's replication causes disease then that disease arises. Evil did not cause the smallpox germ to exist, and goodness did not cause it to un-exist beause there is no go good or evil - things 'just are'. The universe doesn't care - the world will still orbit the sun even if everyone dies of smallpox.
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@ethang5
I am never sure what point Stephen is trying to make, but I think the problem is that in Chronicles the bible seems to be approve of earthly wealth but in the gospels it disaapproves of them.
The solution is that the Hebrew/Jewish religion changed. If you are an atheist one explains the change in historical and sociological terms. If you are a believer it is due to the change from old to new covenant.
I think both have been explained to Stephen but neither shuts him up!
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@disgusted
I merely request you make your own position clear! in my experience some theists have a real problem accepting that some people simply don't believe god exists. Such theists are convinced atheists hate god, with the implication we 'really' believe in god.
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@Stephen
And no god around it seems to tell moses to stop this vile practice.
Had the writers of the Bible put that God commanded rape to end they would look pretty stupid - or their god weak - as rape most certainly went on.
It can be assumed that killing the men and carrying off the women of vanquished enemies was not considered 'vile' in those days but normal practice in war. Our image of god is coloured by the fatalistic pacifism of Cristianity - the Christian god is 'nice'. The hebrew did not consider 'niceness' to be an essential attribute of a god! YHWH was not nice - but he was powerful, so you wanted that power used against your enemies, not against yourself.
YHWH failed against the babylonians, the greeks and the romans. The notion that their god was all-powerful was hard to maintain, so YhWH was re-invented by Christianity as a 'nice god'.
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@disgusted
So you are not an atheist - you believe god exists and is evil?
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The point is that it's not a story about god or god commanding people to do anything so the thread title 'God of Rape' is misleading. In reality tribal conflicts and 'wife stealing' has happened 'forever' and still goes on today.
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@Stephen
'Don't believe a word of it' is a very simplistic view of my attitude to scripture! What I find difficult is to understand what you believe! You seem to believe one verse but not another on no consistent basis - that puts atheists and theists off!Atheist such as keith prosser who doesn't believe a word of the scriptures, and believes them all to be tall stories; fairy tales, actually attempting to explain ... the scriptures.
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