What's in a creation story -- disturbance, secretion, building, poofing

[lpetrich]

Scott Leonard's book Myths and Religion has some classification of creation-story motifs, like Marta Weigel's detailed one. She in turn worked from the work of Mircea Eliade, Charles Long, Marie-Louise von Franz, and Anna Birgitta Rooth, finding:

1. Primordial elements meet or mingle or otherwise get disturbed.
2. A god creates by secreting something, like sweat or blood or semen or a parthenogenetic child or a spun web or excretions.
3. A god either sacrifices him/herself or gets sacrificed to form the raw materials for creation.
4. The hatching of a cosmic egg or dividing a closely-embraced earth and sky.
5. Someone dives into the primordial ocean to get some sand or mud to create land with.
6. The first people emerge from a small, cramped world into our larger world.
7. There are two creators who either cooperate or compete.
8. Deus faber is the "divine maker"; where a god forms something out of some material.
9. Ex nihilo is "out of nothing", often creation by a god's command. Poof! and it exists.

It is easy to recognize these motifs in familiar creation stories.

• The first Genesis story has #9, of course, though it also has a vestige of #3 in the form of God doing three separations.
• The second Genesis story has #8, with God forming Adam out of dust and Eve from Adam's side or rib. It also has a bit of #2 in God breathing the dust Adam into life.
• Hesiod's Theogony starts off with #1 and continues with #4 (Kronos separating Ouranos and Gaia) and lots of #2 (gods having children). It also has some #8 in Epimetheus and Prometheus creating humanity and animals.
• The Norse one in the Elder Edda starts off with #1, and contains #3 (the dismemberment of Ymir to create our Universe) and #8 (creation of the first people, Ask and Embla, from wood).

The Universe according to modern science fits these motifs surprisingly well.

• Biological evolution is #2, where the kind of secretion is ordinary reproduction.
• The origin of the Solar System is #1, where an interstellar cloud collapses under its own weight. Likewise for the origin of galaxies, which originated in that fashion about a billion years after the Big Bang.
• The origin of the Universe remains a mystery, but the common speculation of origin from a quantum fluctuation is essentially #1. The Big Bang itself is vaguely like #4 (the hatching of a cosmic egg).

How do other creation stories fit in?

 

[Horatio Parker]

Creation myths are about emergence of consciousness.

 

[Lion IRC]

Yes, modern science does indeed fit theistic creation models "surprisingly well".

 

[Keith&Co.]

The Universe according to modern science fits these motifs surprisingly well.

• Biological evolution is #2, where the kind of secretion is ordinary reproduction.

• Except, the whole point of #2 is that humans are created with a spark of the divine, that's what sets us apart from the rest of the animals, and the unliving matter of the universe.
  From science's POV, we're not different from the other animals, and not that much different from the matter that makes us up, anyway.

 

[lpetrich]

Creation myths are about emergence of consciousness.

How so? I don't see any connection.

 

[lpetrich]

The Universe according to modern science fits these motifs surprisingly well.

• Biological evolution is #2, where the kind of secretion is ordinary reproduction.

• Except, the whole point of #2 is that humans are created with a spark of the divine, that's what sets us apart from the rest of the animals, and the unliving matter of the universe.
  From science's POV, we're not different from the other animals, and not that much different from the matter that makes us up, anyway.

• 
  Secretion by a deity, maybe. But evolution involves creation by secretion by ordinary living things: reproduction.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Except, the whole point of #2 is that humans are created with a spark of the divine, that's what sets us apart from the rest of the animals, and the unliving matter of the universe.
From science's POV, we're not different from the other animals, and not that much different from the matter that makes us up, anyway.

Secretion by a deity, maybe. But evolution involves creation by secretion by ordinary living things: reproduction.

Yes, that's why i'm saying science does NOT echo that motif. #2 is a step down, an imparting of power from above, in creation myths.
In evolutionary theory, it's just the same stuff doing a trial and error over and over and over and over and over and...

 

[Horatio Parker]

Creation myths are about emergence of consciousness.

How so? I don't see any connection.

Myths are symbols. We think and relate to reality through symbols. "Creating the world" is symbolic of our awakening awareness.

 

[lpetrich]

Yes, modern science does indeed fit theistic creation models "surprisingly well".

Let's see how well.

What	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
Genesis 1									X
Genesis 2		X						X
Greek	X	X		X				X
Norse	X		X					X
Science	X	X		X

The Universe of modern science thus gets a better fit to Hesiod's Theogony than to either of the Bible's two creation stories. So should we convert to Hellenic paganism?

 

[Keith&Co.]

Yes, modern science does indeed fit theistic creation models "surprisingly well".

Let's see how well.

Doesn't matter. It's just something Lion keeps insisting on, mostly because he believes the creation model, so he accepts those parts of science he can pretend dovetail with his myth. Then he pretends they're evidence FOR his myth.

 

[Lion IRC]

Wait!
Genesis ticks #5 #6 #8

God says let the Earth bring forth. #8

God moving over the surface of the waters #5

etc etc

 

[sdelsolray]

Yes, modern science does indeed fit theistic creation models "surprisingly well".

Your wishful thinking is predictable and boring.

 

[Learner]

• Biological evolution is #2, where the kind of secretion is ordinary reproduction.
• The origin of the Solar System is #1, where an interstellar cloud collapses under its own weight. Likewise for the origin of galaxies, which originated in that fashion about a billion years after the Big Bang.
• The origin of the Universe remains a mystery, but the common speculation of origin from a quantum fluctuation is essentially #1. The Big Bang itself is vaguely like #4 (the hatching of a cosmic egg).

How do other creation stories fit in?

All of the above #1. to #9. can only come about by certain "fixed laws" being there in the first place ... this is the mystery to science but not with creation.

Collisions , reactions , fluctuations , explosions , formation , hatching etc.

 

[Keith&Co.]

All of the above #1. to #9. can only come about by certain "fixed laws" being there in the first place ... this is the mystery to science but not with creation.

Collisions , reactions , fluctuations , explosions , formation , hatching etc.

Is it really a mystery to science?
Science observes that things happen.
The faithful cry 'because God' as a suffix.
They just never produce any real reason to think it's necessary.

ETA: Or maybe consider this. For a long time, it was not a mystery how maggots appeared in raw meat... It was caused by sunlight.
HAVING an answer it not necessarily something to brag about. It depends on how you got the answer.

 

[Learner]

Is it really a mystery to science?
Science observes that things happen.
The faithful cry 'because God' as a suffix.
They just never produce any real reason to think it's necessary.

ETA: Or maybe consider this. For a long time, it was not a mystery how maggots appeared in raw meat... It was caused by sunlight.
HAVING an answer it not necessarily something to brag about. It depends on how you got the answer.

Ah, ok good point.

I can only see the possibility of there being one of two possible answers regarding existence of God. By the known observations with universal laws, theists today can make a deduced proposition (the cause) as one of the two. Obviously we have always said the same thing anyway.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Is it really a mystery to science?
Science observes that things happen.
The faithful cry 'because God' as a suffix.
They just never produce any real reason to think it's necessary.

ETA: Or maybe consider this. For a long time, it was not a mystery how maggots appeared in raw meat... It was caused by sunlight.
HAVING an answer it not necessarily something to brag about. It depends on how you got the answer.

Ah, ok good point.

I can only see the possibility of there being one of two possible answers regarding existence of God. By the known observations with universal laws, theists today can make a deduced proposition (the cause) as one of the two. Obviously we have always said the same thing anyway.

It's not really a deduction if you're going to give the same answer no matter what the evidence is... More of a bias, really.
Like, we KNOW what you think the cause is, we also know you've got bupkes for evidence.

 

[Draconis]

It all boils down to something very like us but magic.

Probably the greatest non-explanation ever.

 

[Learner]

It all boils down to something very like us but magic.

Probably the greatest non-explanation ever.

Not really. Suggesting otherwise could be said to be "science fiction" or fantasy. It boils down to who can make the better proposition with what is available. The "don't knows" need not apply in this regard.

 

[Keith&Co.]

It all boils down to something very like us but magic.

Probably the greatest non-explanation ever.

Not really.

Yeah, really. Inserting God into the topic doesn't make it any more understandable or more predictable. It doesn't provide any explanatory power. It doesn't justify the laws that are observed or guide us in further research to where we might find more laws.

'Because god/gods' is exactly the same as 'it's magic.' An attempt to end the actual conversation with a show-stopper that cannot be challenged.

Suggesting otherwise could be said to be "science fiction". It boils down to who can make the better proposition with what is available. .

Yes, but you've never shown that any gods are available to support your propositions.

 

[Learner]

Yeah, really. Inserting God into the topic doesn't make it any more understandable or more predictable. It doesn't provide any explanatory power. It doesn't justify the laws that are observed or guide us in further research to where we might find more laws.

Its not about someone just inserting God willy nilly. Sounding like an old argument ...prove theres no God -But science has been observing laws for quite some time now is there no implication from study to provide explanatory power God can not exist?

Simplistic terms to my level : Intelligence (and increasing) exist , creation and design "is real" - exampled by our own hand in making. Universal laws "never evolving" still maintains life that is seemingly fragile ,even by evolution (small e) and natural selection (life forms surving and adapting).. so many laws on many levels witout conflictions yet amazingly these laws were there from the very start.

'Because god/gods' is exactly the same as 'it's magic.' An attempt to end the actual conversation with a show-stopper that cannot be challenged.

I thought science could make those challenges. You could challenge magic with science fiction not that I say God is magic.