Do Gods Exist?

Copernicus said:

RIS may be confusing dictionary definitions with meanings.

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It certainly is possible. I tend to think outside the box which can lead to those sorts of errors in the trial-and-error process. Error being a part of that. I have to kick things around to see how they work. Words are like a tool; definitions are what the tools were intended for and meanings are how people use or misuse them. When a word is misused, it can take on a different use than was intended, though usually there is some similarity in the use. A baseball bat is for hitting a ball in sport, but it also can be useful as a weapon. Same with a knife. To me the most important tool for understanding a thing we call something, a name or word for something, is not the meaning or the definition, but the history - the etymology - of the word.

The word soul is a good example. If you look up the etymology of the word soul you get basically it comes from words meaning large bodies of water. Sea. This is because the soul is thought to have been bound by the sea when it wasn't inhabiting the body. While this is true of the modern etymology the problem is it doesn't add up in a practical sense. No problem, it seems, because when you're dealing with superstition it often doesn't need to make sense. The problem with that is that it does. Superstitions arise from the practical application or else they don't become used. It has to have massive appeal.

If you take your etymological exploration further than can easily be had online (believe it or not Google doesn't know everything) you come up with the soul as coming from a word that means to bind. (i.e. bound by the sea). Superstitious people used to bind the wrists and ankles of the dead to prevent the immortal soul from harming or pestering the living. The dead from harming the undead. So, while you don't easily find binding to be a part of the relatively later etymology directly you do see its meaning incorporated in the sea. Which doesn't really make any sense otherwise. You have something that generally has to do with animation, life being about something to bind. Animation to inanimate life to death.

Transliteration is the translation of a letter of the source to a corresponding letter of the target language. A translation is the translation of a word in the same manner. Jewish scholars got fed up with the translation of the English (target) word soul for the Hebrew word nephesh. Consequently, they began transliterating the word. Translation of the word nephesh had been difficult because the closest use of the word - soul - was not a very good one. Life is a good translation of nephesh to some extent, and depending on the context even modern translation of life from nephesh (or variations of) are used. So, in the case of words like soul, hell, god, spirit the syncretism of religion becomes problematic because the words of the pagan (meaning outside of) religions become commonly used for the contradictory or even similar Biblical. For example, nephesh means life, life experiences of any breathing creature. It comes from a word literally meaning breather. It literally means that. It becomes a word meaning bind or sea. The Biblical Hebrew for life becomes the pagan for immortality through, of all things, death. Everything gets distorted. Then you have to address the distortion.

Propaganda. George Orwell and a host of other prominent thinkers of our time have said all art is propaganda. People think of propaganda as being the bullshit of the powerful, but actually it means and can be defined as "information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a particular cause, doctrine, or point of view." Someone not very good with debate will not pick up on especially in that definition, in effect mistaking it for necessarily. It's most commonly used as such but not necessarily. The common doesn't negate the less common application even if the most common application is actually commonly used. Misuse by limiting the word becomes more powerful than the actual meaning. The purpose of the art of debate isn't to win against your opponent, it's to learn. You do that by exploring and then comparing your errors with theirs. It's all about logical fallacies, but you have to synchronize your use with their uses and misuses as demonstrable through etymology of words. Otherwise, you can't communicate. When you're debating Biblical subject I have a lot of translation, transliteration, interpretation, etymology, definitions, meanings and logic at my command. My opponent has little if any use of any of that. They only have ideology and tradition. They are opposed to my ideology and tradition. The problem for me personally is that I reject the same ideology and tradition they do, only for a different reason. This is apparently manifest in a similarity, my influence by the Jehovah's Witnesses so when all else fails just dismiss me as such, but there is nothing original about anything I or my benefactors the Jehovah's Witnesses say. It all comes from the source and for the most part dispells the pagan (again, outside of) influence on the modern-day tradition.

Rhea said:

RIS said:

Okay, first of all are you "educated" on what the word blasphemy means. I don't just mean how the laypeople use the word, I mean what it means.

You obviously aren't, and there would be no point in me telling you,

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That’s an odd thing to say. Why would there be no point in telling me the definition you plan to use in your reply?

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Because you won't listen and so it doesn't matter. It would only be a distraction that would, if you were adamant, in our wasting each other's time in a tail chasing piss contest. Those can be fun, but they get old after about [looks at watch] 20 years.

Rhea said:

Wouldn’t that end up being a deliberate obfuscation? Why would anyone trying to communicate in good faith do that?

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NICE! That's pretty good. Very sort of subtle. But no. It wouldn't ba a deliberate obfuscation on my part, it would be an inadvertent obfuscation on your part. Me explaining to you what blasphemy originally meant compared to what it means now would be like a kindergarten teacher explaining uclidian - Euclidean, sorry - geometry to their student learning simple math. My maths really suck, too. Almost as much as my spelling and grammar. See what I'm up against? Not because you're stupid and I'm absolutely fabulas, but because we are speaking different languages. Hypothetically speaking. And . . . plus, you obviously aren't stupid and I'm obviously not absolutely fabulas. It was just a dream, baby. We had some good times, but now, they're gone.

Rhea said:

RIS said:

I watched a Christian award-winning molecular biologist who had saved millions of lives with her work explaining to a panel how she had isolated a pathogen and another scientist on the panel said she was lying, that she had never isolated a pathogen because you can't do that

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What is the name of this award-winning Christian molecular biologist, and where and when was the panel held? Who knows, maybe I was there?

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What I suspect you will do, is use her destruction by powers that be in the capturing of medical science by the pharmaceutical corporations and lobbyist effectively dismissing her as well as my humble self and therefore your dumb fake ideology as misinformation conspiricy theory ad nausium. All in the name of science. Which I think is a good thing. Very useful to me for you to use that tool.

Here.

pood said:

Maybe His Lordship while change his massive mind and deign to edumacate the unwashed heathen rabble here what the word “blasphemy” really means.

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A Response To What The Bible Says About Blasphemy

Blasphemy is an anglicized version of the Greek word blasphemia which in Greek meant any injurious, abusive or defamatory speech towards God or men. The English version of the word though, usually applies only to such speech directed to God or sacred things. The SAB is correct in saying that blasphemers were to be stoned to death, but they fail to correctly indicate that blasphemy was only punishable by death under the Mosaic Law.

Satan was the first and remains the primary instigator of blasphemy (Genesis 3:1-5 / John 8:44-49) for suggesting that God was untruthful. Calling upon the name of God, as mentioned at Genesis 4:26 was apparently not done in an appropriate way, as is indicated by the Jerusalem Targum, which says: "That was the generation in whose days they began to err, and to make themselves idols, and surnamed their idols by the name of the Word of the Lord." It is believed that men began applying the name of God to men, and/or to idols of worship.

The first three of the Ten Commandments dealt with Jehovah God's sovereignty and exclusive right deserving worship. Calling down evil upon God or cursing a chieftain was also blasphemy deserving death. The first case of this happening after the Ten Words were given was when a son of an Israelite woman and an Egyptian man was stoned for abusing the name of God and calling down evil upon it. From then on the offense was punishable by stoning to death. (Exodus 20:1-7 / Leviticus 24:10-16)

Blasphemy didn't need to be expressed vocally in the Hebrew Scriptures to be considered as blasphemy. A blatant disrespect for Jehovah God's laws was also considered blasphemy, though the unintentional lawbreaker was given mercy. (Numbers 15:27-31 / Nehemiah 9:18) It didn't always result in death.

Some examples of blasphemy in the Hebrew Scriptures are Eli's sons (1 Samuel 3:12-13), the Assyrian official Rabshakeh, (2 Kings 19:4-6, 22-23) and that of false prophets (Jeremiah 23:16-17). Naboth, though innocent, was convicted of blasphemy and was stoned to death based upon the testimony of false witnesses.

The incorrect view began to take effect that the pronunciation of God's name was a blasphemous act based upon a misapplication of Leviticus 24:10-16. Talmudic tradition also indicates that upon hearing the testimony of blasphemous words of the accused, religious judges should tear their garments; this is based upon 2 Kings 18:37; 19:1-4. (Jewish Encyclopedia, 1976, Vol. III, p. 237)

The importance of the name in the Hebrew Scriptures and among Semitic people should not be overlooked. According to Professor G.T. Manely: "A study of the word 'name' in the OT reveals how much it means in Hebrew. The name is no mere label, but is significant of the real personality of him to whom it belongs. . . . When a person puts his 'name' upon a thing or another person the latter comes under his influence and protection." (New Bible Dictionary, edited by J. D. Douglas, 1985, p. 430.)

Deuteronomy 23:2 forbids illegitimate children from coming into the congregation. Adultery, punishable by the death of the unborn child along with the mother and father, (Leviticus 20:10 / Deuteronomy 22:22) was forbidden due to the breakdown of the family arrangement and would result in the child having no inheritance. All of this would have a devastating effect upon society. For this reason the illegitimate child of David was taken. (2 Samuel 12:14) Since Jehovah had a Kingdom covenant with David he wasn't put to death. (2 Samuel 7:11-16)

Paul used the Greek verb blasphemeo at Romans 2:24 in reference to Ezekiel 36:20-21 which demonstrates the harmony of the basic meaning of the word from Hebrew to Greek. Herod committed blasphemy when he claimed the prerogative of God (Acts 12:21-22)

Jesus was accused of blasphemy when he forgave sins, (Matthew 9:2-3) when he claimed to be God's son, (John 10:33-36) and for telling the Sanhedrin that he would sit at the right hand of God, to which they proclaimed him worthy of death. (Mark 14:61-64) They had no authority from the Romans, however, so they shrewdly changed the charge to sedition. (John 18:29 - 19:16)

Blasphemy against the holy spirit is the only unforgivable sin (Luke 12:10) Blasphemy comes from the heart and must be a willful and deliberate act, not merely a result of imperfection or human weakness.

It’s spelled “fabulous.”

pood said:

Maybe His Lordship while change his massive mind and deign to edumacate the unwashed heathen rabble here what the word “blasphemy” really means.

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But that's the thing... Blasphemy has always throughout history meant "anything said by the accused that calls anything believed about God by the accuser into question."

My mere observations of the limitations of the omnipotence a god has over their creations (literally the ability to pause a clock, save the state, and twiddle bits side-channel-like)? Blasphemy!

My observations that the ability to pause a memory field also gives you the ability to read the field itself, but how this doesn't automatically grant the ability to interpret that?

The fact that I observe both require the God themselves to do work, even if that work is invisible to the creation, literally happening in "outside time" rather than during the transition of "inside clock cycles"?

Me observing I am a god of many universes and clearly also a shitty, lazy, self absorbed human?

All blasphemy.

All of them are eminently true!

But also, they are blasphemy.

pood said:

It’s spelled “fabulous.”

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English, yes. Not in Latin. I do that because I'm so used to pointing out Paul's use of the Greek word mythos which was later translated into the Latin fabulas. See? I'm absolutely fabulas! Not. You didn't get it?

Yeah, that's it. It was a joke. Yeah.

Jarhyn said:

Blasphemy has always throughout history meant "anything said by the accused that calls anything believed about God by the accuser into question."

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Well, no, not always throughout history. Anyway, it's also used ironically.

Jarhyn said:

My mere observations of the limitations of the omnipotence a god has over their creations (literally the ability to pause a clock, save the state, and twiddle bits side-channel-like)? Blasphemy!

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Your mode of speech is, at times, difficult to follow Earthling man. Anyway, let's explore the omnibus!

Consider omnivore. There's a very scientific term. Does it mean can eat everything, like the Eiffel tower or space time continuum or does it have a more practical application? After you kick that around a bit think of omnipresent. Is God omnipresent? Not according to the Bible. According to it he can't even come to the universe let alone the temple. His position is fixed in heaven.

Is he omniscient? Well, he had to ask Adam, Eve and Cain what they had done. He had to send angels to confirm his suspicions about Sodom and Gomorrah, and send spies out to the promised land.

Is he omnipotent? Well, he can't lie, can't fit in the universe, didn't see any of the aforementioned.

So, if you've come to the conclusion that God isn't any of those things in the hyperbolic/religious nonsense sort of way it has been presented, good job.

Jarhyn said:

My observations that the ability to pause a memory field also gives you the ability to read the field itself, but how this doesn't automatically grant the ability to interpret that?

The fact that I observe both require the God themselves to do work, even if that work is invisible to the creation, literally happening in "outside time" rather than during the transition of "inside clock cycles"?

Me observing I am a god of many universes and clearly also a shitty, lazy, self absorbed human?

All blasphemy.

All of them are eminently true!

But also, they are blasphemy.

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Right. So, uh - how 'bout those Giants, huh?

Elixir said:

RIS said:

I see atheists as in the Latin sense of imitatio dei; imitation of god. It isn't that they don't believe in gods, it's that they want to be gods.

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I see theist projection.

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When an atheist and probably most theists think of the word God, they think creator of the universe exercising power and control over mankind.

The Bible writers were henotheistic. They see a god more in the latter sense of the above than the former. Control rather than creation. We were created in his likeness. Obviously not physical because he isn't physical. Man and woman. In other words, he possesses no sexual organs but he possesses personality, characteristics of both - creativity, for example. If you follow the link, you will note I'm using the Latin term differently than the strictly theological application there. I'm just saying that you don't believe in a created universe. In creation. You want power. You are a cog in an ideological sociopolitical paradigm and you naturally want to wrestle the power of the religious nuts who have been running the show for far too long away from them.

Who wouldn't? But the point is that is actually what the atheist vs theist brouhaha is all about. Not the question of "God(s)" existence.

RIS said:

Rhea said:

RIS said:

Okay, first of all are you "educated" on what the word blasphemy means. I don't just mean how the laypeople use the word, I mean what it means.

You obviously aren't, and there would be no point in me telling you,

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That’s an odd thing to say. Why would there be no point in telling me the definition you plan to use in your reply?

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Because you won't listen and so it doesn't matter. It would only be a distraction that would, if you were adamant, in our wasting each other's time in a tail chasing piss contest. Those can be fun, but they get old after about [looks at watch] 20 years.

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So, “new member,” who has been here for [looks at watch] less than a week, decides to declare that I am the kind of person to ask a question and ignore the answer.

That seems rather - arrogant, self-important and prideful, as well as mean and ultimately just plain false. But what’s interesting is that it seems like an own-goal, really. What’s the point of introducing the prideful and insulting claim of stranger, “you’re going to react in poor character!!” When one could just as easily have just written what YOU meant by the word when you used it.

I always find that interesting, when people decide to attack instead of inform. It’s as if they are trying to protect a vacuous position through obfuscation. They sort of… tell on themselves.

You could have just explained how you thought the word you introduced into the conversation was being misinterpreted.

You wrote: “Of course it does. How could science ever possibly be wrong, or corrupted?! BLASPHEMY!!”
And I replied, “Science has never ever claimed to be infallible, so using the word “blasphemy” is completely out of scope.”

The only way that I could be misusing the word is if you wrote a paragraph that had zero connection between the second sentence and the third. Between YOU saying “wrong or corrupted” and YOU saying “Blasphemy,” all I did was say that science never claimed to be incorruptable or never wrong.

You then followed up with several posts trying to quickly change the topic to “souls” or some such.

But mostly, let’s ponder why you, having been here 6 days, thought you could predict whethern or not I’d listen to your definition. Are you a reincarnation of a previous user? Are you judging me with a broad brush of “all atheists do somethingsomething”? What causes a person to make such a claim agains someone else’s character as soon as they meet them?

So interesting.

RIS said:

Rhea said:

Wouldn’t that end up being a deliberate obfuscation? Why would anyone trying to communicate in good faith do that?

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NICE! That's pretty good. Very sort of subtle. But no. It wouldn't ba a deliberate obfuscation on my part, it would be an inadvertent obfuscation on your part.

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Ahh. It’s my fault you hit me.
Yah, no.
You said I didn’t understand your word. And you immediately claimed I was incapable of understanding it, and would therefore not explain yourself.


So, SO interesting.

RIS said:

Me explaining to you what blasphemy originally meant compared to what it means now would be like a kindergarten teacher explaining uclidian - Euclidean, sorry - geometry to their student learning simple math.

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Euclidean geometry is not hard, and the principles behind it are certainly in the repertoire of a kindergarten teacher, and can easily be conveyed as principles. “Know your basics, test all your other theories against them.”

And what Blasphemy “originally meant” is irrelevant unless that’s how YOU used it in your sentence, “How could science ever possibly be wrong, or corrupted?! BLASPHEMY!!” in which case, just explain what was wrong with my interpretation and how you intended to use it.

RIS said:

My maths really suck, too.

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Apparently.

RIS said:

Almost as much as my spelling and grammar. See what I'm up against? Not because you're stupid and I'm absolutely fabulas, but because we are speaking different languages.

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I am perfectly capable of learning languages. One starts by being willing to define how one is using words. Your use of the word blasphemey is entirely consistent with my reply to it. The problem only arises when you backtrack and cringe with “I won’t tell you what I mean.”

RIS said:

Hypothetically speaking. And . . . plus, you obviously aren't stupid and I'm obviously not absolutely fabulas. It was just a dream, baby. We had some good times, but now, they're gone.

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??

RIS said:

Rhea said:

RIS said:

I watched a Christian award-winning molecular biologist who had saved millions of lives with her work explaining to a panel how she had isolated a pathogen and another scientist on the panel said she was lying, that she had never isolated a pathogen because you can't do that

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What is the name of this award-winning Christian molecular biologist, and where and when was the panel held? Who knows, maybe I was there?

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What I suspect you will do, is use her destruction by powers that be in the capturing of medical science by the pharmaceutical corporations and lobbyist effectively dismissing her as well as my humble self and therefore your dumb fake ideology as misinformation conspiricy theory ad nausium. All in the name of science. Which I think is a good thing. Very useful to me for you to use that tool.

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Again with the poisoning the well. Why do you feel the need to impugn me, who you have just met six days ago (your join date here)?

It is very interesting to me to ponder why you would do that instead of just engaging in discussion of the topic.

RIS said:

Here.

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It is impolite (and against the TOU) to post blind links. You are required to add a paragraph summarizing what the link is, and what in the link you think is relevant to the discussion. I am not pleased to be shunted to a video.

All you had to do was give the name, “Judy Mokovitz” and the date and name of the panel you attended. Was it the panel around her 2009 paper? What conference were you attending?

At any rate, you brought her up to demonstrate “with a scientific example” that people who don’t know the meaning of a word or topic will be unable to understand the argument. An issue which is easily rectified by you simply saying what you mean and finding out whether I have some “dumb fake ideology as misinformation conspiricy theory ad nausium.” or not.

So the particulars of her illustrious career, including her co-authors retracting the paper, and her subsequent attempts to repeat the exeriment, wherein she refuted her own thesis:

Mikovits and collaborators participated, with two other research groups, in a larger 2012 study with 147 CFS patients and 146 controls. The study concluded that there was no evidence of XMRV or MLV infection in either group, a result which Mikovits agreed was "the definitive answer" on the issue.

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…are just a distraction. By the way, for the record, I studied biochemistry at a graduate level, and also have a family member with CFS, so I have no trepidation about trying to understand the case of Dr. Mokovitz, contrary to your dismissive, insulting and self-revealing assumption.

In sum: I used the word Blaspemy in the same sense you did and all the rest is you demonstrating the paucity of your argument. Conclusion: “Blasphemy” is not something that happens in science.

ideologyhunter said:

It's usually a bad idea to tell a group what their motives and secret thoughts are.

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Even if they can't see it for themselves? Or that it might be an observation, even if incorrect, has some reason behind it? For the exploration and examination of - oh, I don't know - THE WORLD!

You see what I did there?

ideologyhunter said:

We had another guy who posted here a while back who was always doing that.

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Well, I mean, you know, the temptation isn't exclusively applied to specific persons but rather a class of people. [looks around surriptuously] Some people see through disguises.

RIS said:

Elixir said:

RIS said:

I see atheists as in the Latin sense of imitatio dei; imitation of god. It isn't that they don't believe in gods, it's that they want to be gods.

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I see theist projection.

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When an atheist and probably most theists think of the word God, they think creator of the universe exercising power and control over mankind.

The Bible writers were henotheistic. They see a god more in the latter sense of the above than the former. Control rather than creation. We were created in his likeness. Obviously not physical because he isn't physical. Man and woman. In other words, he possesses no sexual organs but he possesses personality, characteristics of both - creativity, for example. If you follow the link, you will note I'm using the Latin term differently than the strictly theological application there. I'm just saying that you don't believe in a created universe. In creation. You want power. You are a cog in an ideological sociopolitical paradigm and you naturally want to wrestle the power of the religious nuts who have been running the show for far too long away from them.

Who wouldn't? But the point is that is actually what the atheist vs theist brouhaha is all about. Not the question of "God(s)" existence.

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Are you obsessed with claiming to know what and how other people think? I enjoy pondering what type of personality it takes to be so certain one can read other people’s thoughts and emotions. Not humble, certainly. Nor accurate.

Fascinating.

RIS said:

ideologyhunter said:

It's usually a bad idea to tell a group what their motives and secret thoughts are.

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Even if they can't see it for themselves? Or that it might be an observation, even if incorrect, has some reason behind it? For the exploration and examination of - oh, I don't know - THE WORLD!

You see what I did there?

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No.

RIS said:

ideologyhunter said:

It's usually a bad idea to tell a group what their motives and secret thoughts are.

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Even if they can't see it for themselves?

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Looks like you did not understand the statement.
Because yes, even if you think they have wrong conclusions, it is usually a bad idea to tell a group that you think you know their motives and secret thoughts.

For one thing, you will never communicate with them effectively if you don’t know, or try to know, what THEY think they think.
For the second, your odds of being dead flat wrong and destroying your own reputation as a serious conversationalist are high.

RIS said:

Or that it might be an observation, even if incorrect, has some reason behind it? For the exploration and examination of - oh, I don't know - THE WORLD!

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If your observation, even if incorrect, has some reason behind it, you will STILL be ill-served to make claims that you know the motives and secret thoughts of others.

For one thing, you will never communicate with them effectively if you don’t know what THEY think they think.
For the second, your odds of being dead flat wrong and destroying your own reputation as a serious conversationalist are high.

RIS said:

You see what I did there?

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Yah, we did. It’s why ideologyhunter was giving you some useful advice.

RIS said:

ideologyhunter said:

We had another guy who posted here a while back who was always doing that.

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Well, I mean, you know, the temptation isn't exclusively applied to specific persons but rather a class of people. [looks around surriptuously] Some people see through disguises.

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Indeed we do. Indeed we do.

Rhea said:

So, “new member,” who has been here for [looks at watch] less than a week, decides to declare that I am the kind of person to ask a question and ignore the answer.

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Yes. Unfortunatly. Occupational hazzard. Most people do. I'm thinking you will as well. And, by the way, I posted, although very briefly, on the IIDB forum years ago. I think in the mid to late 90s. I know that isn't relevant to the point you were making, it's just an aside. I say briefly because it just wasn't for me. At the time it was much more a reflection of accademia, intelligentsia, philosophy for my more practical approach to spirituality. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I would be shivering in a fetal position in a puddle of my own sterile urine if it weren't for some of their work, but let them hash that out, it isn't my objective.

Rhea said:

That seems rather - arrogant, self-important and prideful, as well as mean and ultimately just plain false.

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It isn't polite in the more subtle fashion that you employ but it's accuracy may demonstrably tested as we continue. As either true or false. I would prefer it to be revealed as false, but that is optimism in its purest form given my experience.

Rhea said:

But what’s interesting is that it seems like an own-goal, really.

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Sorry, I'm not familiar with the terminology. Own-goal?

Rhea said:

What’s the point of introducing the prideful and insulting claim of stranger, “you’re going to react in poor character!!” When one could just as easily just written what YOU meant by the word when you used it.

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I've explained that. Just look at any of the threads where the simple word god is disputed. The atheists telling the theist what the word means and being given a mountain of evidence only to be endlessly mocked and scorned with nonsense; all while admitting agreement anyway. This forum on the subject of the existence of gods is only intended to discuss the existence of what we think is actually just one of the billions of gods, some of whom exist and others that don't blah, blah, blah. It's a futile exchange, especially if you've already had it with a thousand other people who adhere to the same ideology. Better left unsaid.

Rhea said:

I always find that interesting, when people decide to attack instead of inform. It’s as if they are trying to protecg a vacuous position through obfuscation. They sort of… tell on themselves.

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Yes, I know, I've read your thoughts on obfuscation. Blasphemy means injurious, abusive speech. I used it ironically. Science could be wrong. BLASPHEMY! Yes, I know science can be wrong and it is useful, but from an ideologue's perspective science could be wrong but not when I use it. Obviously.

Rhea said:

You could have just explained how you thought the word you introduced into the conversation was being misinterpreted.

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It wasn't the point.

Rhea said:

You wrote: “Of course it does. How could science ever possibly be wrong, or corrupted?! BLASPHEMY!!”
And I replied, “Science has never ever claimed to be infallible, so using the word “blasphemy” is completely out of scope.”

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Yes. And you didn't pick up on the irony? Religion claims to be infallible? Religion deems blasphemy to be something against God which they can't employ because they are infallible representations of God? So anyone that disagrees with them is what? Blasphemer. I was alluding to the religious nature of science from the perspective of an ideologue. Conspiracy theory. Quack. Same sort of dismissal.

Rhea said:

The only way that I could be misusing the word is if you wrote a paragraph that had zero connection between the second sentence and the third. Between YOU saying “wrong or corrupted” and YOU saying “Blasphemy,” because all I did was say that science never claimed to be incorruptable or never wrong.

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Thus the irony.

Rhea said:

You then followed up with several posts trying to quickly change the topic to “souls” or some such.

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What are we talking about. Nevermind how I'm obviously wrong in that the single word blasphemy ending up in a pissing contest. Obviously that isn't going to happen. What was I thinking?! Hell has no fury like an ideologue scorned. That's what I was thinking.

Rhea said:

But mostly, let’s ponder why you, having been here 6 days, thought you could predict whethern or not I’d listen to your definition. Are you a reincarnation of a previous user? Are you judging me with a broad brush of “all theists do somethingsomething”? What causes a person to make such a claim agains someone else’s character as soon as they meet them?

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Experience. All theists do somethingsomething. All atheists do somethingsomething. All ideologues do somethingsomething. Specificly. More generally all people do somethingsomething.

Rhea said:

So interesting.

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Not.

Rhea said:

Ahh. It’s my fault you hit me.
Yah, no. You said I didn’t understand your word. And you immediately claimed I was incapable of undersgtanding it, and would therefore not explain yourself.

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I don't care. I don't want to have this tedious discussion again. Please, if you want to make a point, about whatever we were talking about, forget all of the bullshit which I'm not going to read from here on and get to the fucking point. I don't care about you and me. What even was the point?

Rhea said:

Indeed we do. Indeed we do.

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What are we talking about? What is the point of what we are talking about? Can you tell me? What is on the other side of the masks we are wearing? What is the point? I don't care if you are Sponge Bob Square Pants or Christopher Hitchens. What are you saying about the subject?

Self importance is the best kind of importance… for some very “holy” people, seeking to teach others what they know not themselves

RIS, you are obviously a very dedicated ideologue yourself, so all this indignation you profess for ideologues does not go over very well.

RIS said:

Copernicus said:

RIS may be confusing dictionary definitions with meanings.

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It certainly is possible. I tend to think outside the box which can lead to those sorts of errors in the trial-and-error process. Error being a part of that. I have to kick things around to see how they work. Words are like a tool; definitions are what the tools were intended for and meanings are how people use or misuse them. When a word is misused, it can take on a different use than was intended, though usually there is some similarity in the use. A baseball bat is for hitting a ball in sport, but it also can be useful as a weapon. Same with a knife. To me the most important tool for understanding a thing we call something, a name or word for something, is not the meaning or the definition, but the history - the etymology - of the word.

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Then you need to guard against etymological fallacy. That is a type of fallacy where a person equivocates between contemporary and historical usage. It is closely associated with the idea that there is some kind of "true meaning" associated with a word, as opposed to meaning determined by conventional usage. Word meanings shift and can change radically over time. We learn how to use words by associating them with experiences. That is, their psychological function is to call up a bundle of related experiences. Language only works because people have shared experiences that words can evoke. Think of language as word-guided mental telepathy. If you go back in history, people not only have different experiences, but their words evoked those different experiences, not ones that are always familiar to the current generation of speakers.

RIS said:

The word soul is a good example. If you look up the etymology of the word soul you get basically it comes from words meaning large bodies of water. Sea. This is because the soul is thought to have been bound by the sea when it wasn't inhabiting the body. While this is true of the modern etymology the problem is it doesn't add up in a practical sense. No problem, it seems, because when you're dealing with superstition it often doesn't need to make sense. The problem with that is that it does. Superstitions arise from the practical application or else they don't become used. It has to have massive appeal.

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This is why the etymology of the word soul is not really relevant to current usage. I don't know where you got your information about the etymology of soul, but it comes from Old English sāwol, which dates back to the 8th century. It is related to other Indo-European words having to do with swift movement or air, but the Germanic usage settled the concept of a spiritual part of a person that animated the body. Of course, we know a lot more now about how brains work nowadays, so it is questionable whether one can separate animacy from physical neural activity. However, the conventional meaning depends on the assumption that souls are not physical in nature--that reality consists of two different domains: the spiritual and the material. Hence, there are debates over whether souls can exist independently of physical bodies.

RIS said:

If you take your etymological exploration further than can easily be had online (believe it or not Google doesn't know everything) you come up with the soul as coming from a word that means to bind. (i.e. bound by the sea). Superstitious people used to bind the wrists and ankles of the dead to prevent the immortal soul from harming or pestering the living. The dead from harming the undead. So, while you don't easily find binding to be a part of the relatively later etymology directly you do see its meaning incorporated in the sea. Which doesn't really make any sense otherwise. You have something that generally has to do with animation, life being about something to bind. Animation to inanimate life to death.

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You aren't really "exploring" etymology, but speculating about it. There are ways of actually investigating etymologies, but they take a lot of training and years of studying how to avoid the pitfalls of speculation. I don't know Old English very well, but, from what I can tell, sāwol did not have any association with the sea. It might have been related to Greek usage in some way historically, because classical languages such as Greek and Latin influenced even so-called pagan cultures through interaction with the Greek and Roman empires. However, much of this is speculation, albeit scholarly speculation.

RIS said:

Transliteration is the translation of a letter of the source to a corresponding letter of the target language. A translation is the translation of a word in the same manner. Jewish scholars got fed up with the translation of the English (target) word soul for the Hebrew word nephesh. Consequently, they began transliterating the word. Translation of the word nephesh had been difficult because the closest use of the word - soul - was not a very good one. Life is a good translation of nephesh to some extent, and depending on the context even modern translation of life from nephesh (or variations of) are used. So, in the case of words like soul, hell, god, spirit the syncretism of religion becomes problematic because the words of the pagan (meaning outside of) religions become commonly used for the contradictory or even similar Biblical. For example, nephesh means life, life experiences of any breathing creature. It comes from a word literally meaning breather. It literally means that. It becomes a word meaning bind or sea. The Biblical Hebrew for life becomes the pagan for immortality through, of all things, death. Everything gets distorted. Then you have to address the distortion.

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Again, this kind of amateurish speculation is not really worth the effort you are putting into it. I don't know where you got all of this from, but you should at least know that 'transliteration' is just a transduction of alphabetic symbols from one writing convention to another. It is true that the romanization of Hebrew--transliterating Hebrew script into Latin alphabetic symbols--presents some problems, but that is true for all Hebrew words, not just nephesh (נפש--normally transliterated as 'neh-fesh'). That particular word is associated with breath, wind, or spirit, not water, but you are struggling to make a connection there.

RIS said:

Propaganda. George Orwell and a host of other prominent thinkers of our time have said all art is propaganda. People think of propaganda as being the bullshit of the powerful, but actually it means and can be defined as "information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a particular cause, doctrine, or point of view." Someone not very good with debate will not pick up on especially in that definition, in effect mistaking it for necessarily. It's most commonly used as such but not necessarily. The common doesn't negate the less common application even if the most common application is actually commonly used. Misuse by limiting the word becomes more powerful than the actual meaning. The purpose of the art of debate isn't to win against your opponent, it's to learn. You do that by exploring and then comparing your errors with theirs. It's all about logical fallacies, but you have to synchronize your use with their uses and misuses as demonstrable through etymology of words. Otherwise, you can't communicate. When you're debating Biblical subject I have a lot of translation, transliteration, interpretation, etymology, definitions, meanings and logic at my command. My opponent has little if any use of any of that. They only have ideology and tradition. They are opposed to my ideology and tradition. The problem for me personally is that I reject the same ideology and tradition they do, only for a different reason. This is apparently manifest in a similarity, my influence by the Jehovah's Witnesses so when all else fails just dismiss me as such, but there is nothing original about anything I or my benefactors the Jehovah's Witnesses say. It all comes from the source and for the most part dispells the pagan (again, outside of) influence on the modern-day tradition.

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I tried to follow your gish gallop from propaganda to JWs there, but I couldn't make a lot of sense of it. I just wanted to caution you to avoid being overly speculative about the nature of word meanings and their historical shifts.