Michael Eco Tries to Debunk Mark Armitage bc He's Creationist, Gavron88 at least tries to argue dating methods

Under a video, for the moment less important which one, I made these comments, and they sparked some debate:

25:00 Death Valley is in CA. Mary Higby Schweitzer found the dino soft tissue in a bone from Montana.

26:12 That she made a discovery doesn't give her some kind of academic copyright so no one else can draw other conclusions from it without her permission.

And here is the debate:

Crispr CAS9

Also, the last time I talked to her she was still an Evangelical Christian, just not a creationist.

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl Sure, but if you draw a really stupid conclusion, like it's a young sample, you'd still be wrong and stupid, even if you weren't violating any copyrights.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Crispr CAS9 I did not dispute that.

While a Catholic and a Creationist, I think "The Kennedy Report" bungles the case.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco "like it's a young sample,"

How young? How much older than in Young Earth?

Crispr CAS9

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "I did not dispute that." I... didn't say you did? I was just adding to what you said.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Crispr CAS9 Thank you, very kind of you!

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl Well Creationists say the earth is 6 thousand years old.

But Schweitzer's dinosaur sample is dated to about 70 million years old. So yes, older by several orders of magnitude.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco The thing is, after 70 million years, there should be no soft tissue left.

And even more clearly after 65 - even more million years, there should be no measurable Carbon 14 left.

The point of young earth creationism in a certain type of questions is precisely:

• we don't believe the datings that contradict Biblical chronology
• we believe there are other ways to explain results from used dating methods
• and sometimes reasons to reject them even on solely scientific grounds.

Telling me 70 million years old is obtained by "dating" is like telling an Atheist, the Resurrection of Jesus is true because the Bible tells me so - just because it's the word of God, without any reference to why it's historically reliable.

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "The thing is, after 70 million years, there should be no soft tissue left."

Why do you think people were surprised by the find?

" there should be no measurable Carbon 14 left."

Carbon 14 has nothing to do with it.

"The point of young earth creationism in a certain type of questions is precisely...:'

The point is young earth creationists are liars, frauds, and scientifically illiterate.

"Telling me 70 million years old is obtained by "dating" is like telling an Atheist, the Resurrection of Jesus is true because the Bible tells me so - just because it's the word of God, without any reference to why it's historically reliable."

No, it's not. Because it's an established fact that the Bible is wrong. But we have actual physical evidence for dating of 70 million year old fossils.

There are not two sides of a coin here.

If you really wanted to know how dating 70 million year old fossils works, you wouldn't be a Creationist.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco "Why do you think people were surprised by the find?"

Indeed.

"Carbon 14 has nothing to do with it."

Did you miss I mentioned Mark Armitage's subsequent research?

"The point is young earth creationists are liars, frauds, and scientifically illiterate."

The point is you are a barbarian fanatic.

"No, it's not."

Let's see how you argue ...

"Because it's an established fact that the Bible is wrong."

Not really. You are at least not trying to establish it.

"But we have actual physical evidence for dating of 70 million year old fossils."

And you are not trying to evidence how physical observations in the present are supposed to show the 70 million years.

"If you really wanted to know how dating 70 million year old fossils works, you wouldn't be a Creationist."

If you really wanted to know it, you would have given the arguments instead of this flat commonplace.

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "Did you miss I mentioned Mark Armitage's subsequent research?"

Mark Armitage is a creationist. He doesn't do research. He just makes up lies.

"The point is you are a barbarian fanatic."

Case in point.

"Not really. You are at least not trying to establish it."

It's been established for thousands of years. I don't have to reestablish it every time you cry about it.

"And you are not trying to evidence how physical observations in the present are supposed to show the 70 million years.'

I'm not your special education teacher. It's not my job to wipe your butt for you and tell you what a big good boy you are. Like the other flat earthers, you'll just ignore all the help I try to give you.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco "Mark Armitage is a creationist."

Yes.

"He doesn't do research. He just makes up lies."

Non sequitur.

"Case in point."

You just gave one.

"It's been established for thousands of years."

Oh, let's say for 2800 years ... how did Assurbanipal establish the Bible was in error? Did he send and army and claim it was unsuccessful due to mice nibbling bowstrings?

"I don't have to reestablish it every time you cry about it."

You do need to reestablish it or tell me who established it before you and how every time YOU chose to contradict a Christian with those words. Your claim, your burden of evidence.

"I'm not your special education teacher."

I have known some special education teachers or at least one. Let's say a special education teacher for a few dyslectics. I don't think fairly advanced claims and how they are proven or supposedly so came into her scope.

"It's not my job to wipe your butt for you and tell you what a big good boy you are."

I'm not asking you to do that. Not even after the indigestion I got, I wiped myself well enough without you (less sure about the food background for indigestion, but some proof material have already been discarded) ... just in case you forgot it, you were trying to talk of 70 billion years. Some people indeed learned those at age 3 or 4 from pop culture books about dinos, so did I. Perhaps that's as far as you went into the question, I went further by becoming a Christian, a YEC, and a writer in the YEC debate (between ages 9 and 33). I assure you, there is more to it than just your childhood belief in dinos going away millions of years ago.

"Like the other flat earthers,"

Thanks for pretending I'm things which I'm not.

"you'll just ignore all the help I try to give you."

Ah no! Any help you give me to analyse your position will be used to refute it, not ignored!

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "Non sequitur."

That's not what non sequitor means.

"You just gave one."

I didn't, no. You demonstrated creationists being liars. I've said nothing either barbaric or fanatical. That's just you projecting.

"Oh, let's say for 2800 years ... how did Assurbanipal establish the Bible was in error? Did he send and army and claim it was unsuccessful due to mice nibbling bowstrings?"

The Bible didn't exist 2800 years ago, Hans-Georg.

"You do need to reestablish it or tell me who established it before you and how every time YOU chose to contradict a Christian with those words. "

I don't, no.

"just in case you forgot it, you were trying to talk of 70 billion years"

Million. Don't you know the difference?

There is no debate. Maybe if you hadn't given up learning at an early age, you wouldn't be so scientifically illiterate now.

"Thanks for pretending I'm things which I'm not."

Flat earthers and Creationists are the same thing. Both ignore science and basic observations in their fanastical mistake of believing in a literal interpretation of the Bible.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco "That's not what non sequitor means."

I know Latin. It means "does not follow" - and "he does no research" indeed "does not follow" from "he's a creationist".

"I didn't, no. You demonstrated creationists being liars. I've said nothing either barbaric or fanatical. That's just you projecting."

It is barbaric of you to pretend to class someone as a liar according to the world view they defend. And it is over and above that another piece of barbarity to start psych talk with a stranger over the internet - if I'm indeed a stranger to you. If not it is an over civilised treason.

"The Bible didn't exist 2800 years ago, Hans-Georg."

Parts of it did, like Torah, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, first two books of Kings (the ones that in Hebrew are one book called Samuel) and Job, perhaps some more. Apart from that, it cannot have been established thousands of years ago if it wasn't around a thousands of years ago.

"I don't, no."

Ah ... you claim the very assymetric right to make claims without support and take everything I say as a claim needing support. Another piece of barbarity.

"Million. Don't you know the difference?"

My bad.

"There is no debate."

There is, and you pretend to have missed it, but your words on Armitage proves that dishonest.

"Maybe if you hadn't given up learning at an early age, you wouldn't be so scientifically illiterate now."

Again : Thanks for pretending I'm things which I'm not. And did things which I didn't.

"Flat earthers and Creationists are the same thing."

You are again showing secularist fanaticism.

"Both ignore science"

I don't think even flat earthers are quite in that position. When Rob Skiba takes "testing the globe" issues, he gets some things wrong, but not from complete ignorance of science.

"and basic observations"

Even for Rob Skiba, the observations not taken in are far from basic.

"in their fanastical mistake"

Mistakes constitute fanaticism? Or did you misspell fantastical?

"of believing in a literal interpretation of the Bible."

Flat Earthers include quite a few Hindoos. The Bible can easily be taken literally without flat earth, especially the four corners are very traceable on a globe, where land masses meet waters at edges that have angles right or even sharp. You know, places like Alaska for NW corner, Cape Horn for SW, Singapore or Sydney for SE and Kamtchatka for NE.

Believing the Bible literally is far from fanaticism, if that was what you meant, it is the basis for Medieval Scholasticism and all of the civilisation around Collegium Sorbonense in 1277.

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "I know Latin. It means "does not follow" - and "he does no research" indeed "does not follow" from "he's a creationist"."

It does follow. Creationists don't do research. That's why they invent fraudulent fake research journals.

"It is barbaric of you to pretend to class someone as a liar according to the world view they defend. "

It's not, no. It would be dishonest to pretend they're not liars.

""Apart from that, it cannot have been established thousands of years ago if it wasn't around a thousands of years ago."

2,000 years is two thousand years. Plural. This is a good example of the profound inanity that creationists/flat earthers go through.

"There is, and you pretend to have missed it, but your words on Armitage proves that dishonest."

They don't prove that, no. If Armitage was somehow doing research, than there would be something for debate. But there isn't.

"I don't think even flat earthers are quite in that position. When Rob Skiba takes "testing the globe" issues, he gets some things wrong, but not from complete ignorance of science.'

Oh, so you were lying about not being a flat earth too. Quelle surprise. Rob Skiba didn't do research either. He didn't do testing. Yes, he completely ignored science. That's not up for debate either.

"Flat Earthers include quite a few Hindoos."

Odd then, that I've never met any.

"Flat Earthers include quite a few Hindoos. The Bible can easily be taken literally without flat earth, especially the four corners are very traceable on a globe, where land masses meet waters at edges that have angles right or even sharp. You know, places like Alaska for NW corner, Cape Horn for SW, Singapore or Sydney for SE and Kamtchatka for NE."

This isn't a literally interpretation of the Bible. It's you trying to weasel out of the Bible.

"Believing the Bible literally is far from fanaticism, "

It's basically a textbook example.

"Medieval Scholasticism and all of the civilisation around Collegium Sorbonense in 1277."

There's a reason they call it the Dark Ages. But no, Biblical scholars have always known the Bible should not be interpreted literally. They, unlike Creationists, have actually read the thing.

Gavron88

@Hans-Georg Lundahl Sorry, but this soft tissue was a collagen and that can survive millions of years if certain conditions are met. You can read about it in the paper:
"Analyses of soft tissue from Tyrannosaurus rex suggest the presence of protein"
by Mary Higby Schweitzer , Zhiyong Suo, Recep Avci, John M. Asara, Mark A. Allen, Fernando Teran Arce and John R. Horner.

And one more thing - no one use carbon dating to determine age of dinosaur fossils.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco "It does follow. Creationists don't do research. That's why they invent fraudulent fake research journals."

1) Fraudulent research differs from no research.
2) How are their research papers fraudulent (apart from being creationist)?
3) And if they are fraudulent for that exact reason and no other, how is that not a non sequitur alternatively flat out bullying?

"It's not, no. It would be dishonest to pretend they're not liars."

It would be dishonest to pretend you don't act like a bully when you write these things, it would be dishonest to pretend you probably have no routine, and it would be dishonest to pretend your routine of bullying instead of arguing is not barbarism.

"2,000 years is two thousand years. Plural. This is a good example of the profound inanity that creationists/flat earthers go through."

1) The Bible as a collection was not around 2000 years ago, and some important books were not around 2000 years either, though they were so 1900 years ago;
2) Removes the question from Assurbanipal to Trajan or to men in his time. Did Celsus give some good proof the Bible is invalid on your view?

"They don't prove that, no. If Armitage was somehow doing research, than there would be something for debate. But there isn't."

Yes, there is a good reason to debate why those he debunk prefer bullying tactics and pretending there is no debate over trying in a debate to defend their pov ...

"Oh, so you were lying about not being a flat earth too. Quelle surprise."

Not the least. I didn't say I had agreed with him on the point or do so now.

"Rob Skiba didn't do research either. He didn't do testing. Yes, he completely ignored science. That's not up for debate either."

I actually took the trouble to refute one of his arguments. How would you answer an argument like every mile the ground gets away from you it sinks (due to curvature of earth) so many feet or whatever, but it starts from another angle next mile so you soon get to aerth surface being further below you than the building is high? I know how I answered that one.

"Odd then, that I've never met any."

You met all of your Hindoo friends in Calcutta or Mumbai as they prefer to call Bom Bahía? Or you met them in polite Western Academic or health food circles, and many had grandparents who were still Christians or Socialists, since they are Western?

"This isn't a literally interpretation of the Bible. It's you trying to weasel out of the Bible."

Show why it's weaselling and not acceptable interpretation, then?

"It's basically a textbook example."

W a i t ... you are not using "fanaticism" as about violence or close minded dishonesty (of which you are verbally an example), but as "taking your religion seriously" - like Voltaire would call a Catholic "fanatic" for believing the Virgin Birth and the Four Last Things? In that case, "fanaticism" is not a bad thing, it's just a bad name, by bad people (like French Freemasons) for a sometimes good thing.

"There's a reason they call it the Dark Ages."

Dark Ages = Early Middle Ages = from fall of Rome in 476 to Charlemagne or end of Viking age ... yes, there is a military reason, Christendom was besieged by antichristian Barbarians and needed to spend more resources on defence than on learning. You know, the Viking age had ended 211 years before the year I mentioned? Charlemagne was even earlier than that.

"But no, Biblical scholars have always known the Bible should not be interpreted literally."

Would you consider St. Thomas Aquinas as one? Or Bishop Tempier? Would you like to refer me to any quotes in these that make your point (with reference to work, to parts of work, you know, the Summa Theologiae by the former is very minutely subdivided)?

"They, unlike Creationists, have actually read the thing."

And obviously you are equally welcome to give me exact Bible references that should tell me it is not to be taken literally .... just to get a red herring out of the way, taking a text literally does not mean taking an obvious figure of speech literally. If someone ends a narrative with "we stood there fallen off our feet" we don't have the alternative between trying to figure out how someone could be both standing and off their feet or to take the whole narrative as no real story.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Gavron88 I think there is a difference between "can if certain conditions are met" and "a learned person has said they can so".

Carbon dating examinations have been made, and the carbon 14 content measured is above that which would be left after 100 000 and usually even after 50 000 years, and by now, yes, that can be accurately detected.

Gavron88

@Hans-Georg Lundahl " I think there is a difference between "can if certain conditions are met" and "a learned person has said they can so"." - And? I literally gave you name of the study, not someone's opinion on that matter.

"Carbon dating examinations have been made" - I repeat, no one use carbon dating to determine age of dinosaur fossils. Non avian dinosaurs lived over 66 million years ago, carbon dating is useless in this situation.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Gavron88 Yeah, the name of the study means giving me a reference to someone's opinion on the matter. And if you would like me to go there for the arguments, you could be less dismissive about going to Mark Armitage and CMI about carbon 14 content.

"carbon dating is useless in this situation."

As it obviously wasn't useless to Mark Armitage, would you like to argue why the situation of million of years precludes that usefulness? Rather than being itself fairly refuted by it!

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl
"1) Fraudulent research differs from no research."

Yes, it does.

"2) How are their research papers fraudulent (apart from being creationist)?"

They don't do research. They make up claims. They're peer reviewed. I'm not sure what part of fake you're pretending to be confused by.

"It would be dishonest to pretend you don't act like a bully when you write these things"

I am not a bully. That is another lie. You are not a victim, again, pretending like you are is another lie. If you can't handle criticism, then you should stay in your safe space.

And if you're going to dish out insults, you ought to be able to take it.

"2) Removes the question from Assurbanipal to Trajan or to men in his time. Did Celsus give some good proof the Bible is invalid on your view?"

Every biblical scholar that has ever lived has been willing to admit that the Bible is wrong, and contradicts itself. This is not up for debate. This is why the earliest of the church leaders, like St. Augustine, warned about reading the bible literally, and there have never been any serious scholars since that did.

"fanaticism is not a bad thing."

Yes. It is.

"W a i t ... you are not using "fanaticism" as about violence or close minded dishonesty "

I have not been violent, I have not been close-minded, I have not been dishonest. These are more lies. Being close minded means you're unwilling to accept any evidence contrary to your presumptions. I haven't made any presumptions, and you haven't presented any evidence for creationism and flat earth. All you've done is lie and pretend to be a victim.

"And obviously you are equally welcome to give me exact Bible references that should tell me it is not to be taken literally ."

If you've read the Bible, then you don't need me to explain this to you. All of Genesis has been debunked by science. All the crap about the flat earth is also absurd. Then there are the hundreds of self-contradictions. But because you're a close-minded fanatic, you're not going to listen to reason. Just like the rest of the flat earthers.

Gavron88

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "Yeah, the name of the study means giving me a reference to someone's opinion on the matter."

...Are you serious right now?

"As it obviously wasn't useless to Mark Armitage,"

He belong to a group (Creation Research Society) that requires of its members belief that the Bible is historically and scientifically true in the original autographs, belief that "original created kinds" of all living things were created during the Creation week described in Genesis, and belief in flood geology.

In other words, anything they say is made up. Nice try.

" would you like to argue why the situation of million of years precludes that usefulness? Rather than being itself fairly refuted by it!"

So you are claiming that carbon dating refute 4,54 billion years old Earth? So what do you have to say about radiometric dating using other thing than carbon? Like:
- "Samarium–neodymium dating method";
- "Potassium–argon dating method";
- "Uranium–thorium dating method"

and many more? Are you gonna ignore all of this because it's against your opinion about Earth's age? Really?

Can you tell me why should I treat you seriously after statement like that? Do you actually have anything useful to say?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco "Yes, it does."

Shall I take it as "my bad"?

"They don't do research. They make up claims. They're peer reviewed. I'm not sure what part of fake you're pretending to be confused by."

Sarfati made a claim, the mixture of righthanded and lefthanded forms at a Miller Urey experiment is about equal of each molecule produced. Sarfati made a claim that life needs chirality - some molecules are always right handed, better known, some are always left handed. Which of these claims is fraudulent? Sarfati didn't make a claim, but drew a conclusion, that Miller Urey conditions don't explain chirality in life. When did that become a made up claim?

"I am not a bully. That is another lie."

I said acting like a bully in this context.

"You are not a victim, again, pretending like you are is another lie."

I didn't say your bullying tactics were successful.

"If you can't handle criticism, then you should stay in your safe space."

I've said that to some without bullying ... they could have hired someone with your manners and tactics in the hope I would withdraw and leave the internet to them. Not likely.

"And if you're going to dish out insults, you ought to be able to take it."

I didn't start dishing out any insults.

"Every biblical scholar that has ever lived has been willing to admit that the Bible is wrong, and contradicts itself."

Dom Augustin Calmet OSB said that? Or you reserve "Biblical scholar" for the school who are not "admitting" but pushing the claim you mentioned?

"This is not up for debate."

I suppose you will avoid one about Biblical scholars like Calmet, yes ....

"This is why the earliest of the church leaders, like St. Augustine, warned about reading the bible literally, and there have never been any serious scholars since that did."

Oh, he warned us about taking the bible literally, did he? What work, what book, chapter and paragraph?

// "fanaticism is not a bad thing."//

"Yes. It is."

Dishnoest trucnation of quote. I said "in that case" - namely your using "fanaticism" for "taking your religion seriously" - then "fanaticism is not a bad thing" - were you dishonest or too excited to wait and read what I had actually said?

"I have not been violent, I have not been close-minded, I have not been dishonest. These are more lies. Being close minded means you're unwilling to accept any evidence contrary to your presumptions. I haven't made any presumptions, and you haven't presented any evidence for creationism and flat earth. All you've done is lie and pretend to be a victim."

Thank you for showing how much YOU take YOURSELF for a victim ... I try to debate, but with your tactics that only falls flat on your pretending I lie. I asked you to provide examples for quotes specifically stating that Medievals didn't believe the Bible literally, you didn't provide any, you changed the challenge to St. Augustine, and as I just challenged you on providing an exact quote on that you'll skirt, and then resume my tactics as lying, I wouldn't be surprised, and now to the other challenge ...

// "And obviously you are equally welcome to give me exact Bible references that should tell me it is not to be taken literally ." //

"If you've read the Bible, then you don't need me to explain this to you."

1) Not an exact quote
2) I didn't ask you to explain things to me, but to prove your point in a debate.

"All of Genesis has been debunked by science."

1) Like the seven lean years after seven fat years could never be managed by storing grain?
2) Again, not an exact quote, it's not in your interest to provide any, since they don't support your case.

"All the crap about the flat earth is also absurd."

What crap? I never said I believed it? I definitely DID say I had taken the trouble to refute Rob Skiba on it, and that I took the trouble to show how it doesn't follow from the Bible?

"Then there are the hundreds of self-contradictions."

1) Stating there are hundreds of them doesn't amount to citing even one of them.
2) You have also not shown how NOT taking the Bible literally amends any of them.

"But because you're a close-minded fanatic, you're not going to listen to reason. Just like the rest of the flat earthers."

On record, you called me a flat earther again. Sorry, but this time I have to call you a liar.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Gavron88 "...Are you serious right now?"

As serious as you showed yourself about Mark Armitage.

"He belong to a group (Creation Research Society) that requires of its members belief that the Bible is historically and scientifically true in the original autographs, belief that "original created kinds" of all living things were created during the Creation week described in Genesis, and belief in flood geology."

If it were only those tenets, I would like to join them. Unofrtunately, I think that they may have some tenets excluding tradtion from holding its position with the Bible or Magisterium (derived from both and inferior to them) to be infallible.

"In other words, anything they say is made up. Nice try."

In other words refers to synonymity. You haven't documented the YEC stance is synonymous to making up every claim you make, you have just presumed it.

"So you are claiming that carbon dating refute 4,54 billion years old Earth? So what do you have to say about radiometric dating using other thing than carbon? Like:"

I'll take each.

- "Samarium–neodymium dating method";

Don't know it all that much.

- "Potassium–argon dating method";

Vulcanism during the Flood depending on radioactive reactions in the mantle or just below it sped up decay rates and flood waters made sure the argon emitted at eruption within the lava didn't all get out of the lava. Plus, no possibility of historic testing of half life.

- "Uranium–thorium dating method"

No possibility of historic testing of half life. No possibility to know how much of the daughter isotope comes from the parent isotope presumed for the method.

"and many more? Are you gonna ignore all of this because it's against your opinion about Earth's age? Really?"

I gave refutations for two of the three of them. Why don't they cover C14?

1) C14 halflife can be historically tested. 500 years is a significant fraction of 5730 years, and we can determine that fraction means 94.131 % pf original content should be left and so as original content was close to 100 pmC, we should be able to see close to 94.131 pmC.
2) We aren't counting the daughter isotope as such, just the parent isotope.

"Can you tell me why should I treat you seriously after statement like that?"

Like, it could have been smart to hear me out on that matter of other methods, before judging me on a presumed total eclipse on it.

"Do you actually have anything useful to say?"

Yes, go to the stove. Boil some water. Take a tea pot. Heat it with part of the water, rincing it, then pour that water out. Put in tealeaves, in a reasonable proportion to water quantity. Pour in the hot water you'll actually drink as tea. Let it perfuse (under lid of teapot) for 3 to 5 minutes. Pour into a mug. Add sugar, honey or milk or more than one of both to taste. And above all, do so before the next session you presume you could be up against me or some other YEC, so you spare yourself some ridicule!

Gavron88

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "As serious as you showed yourself about Mark Armitage"

I gave you study, you gave me a guy who haven't done any kind of study. I ask again: Are you serious right now?

"If it were only those tenets, I would like to join them" - So you acknowledge that believing in religious text is more important to you than proper scientific research.

Since you made it so obvious, I don't need to respond to the rest of your bs. Congratulations, you lost.

Good day.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Gavron88 "I gave you study, you gave me a guy who haven't done any kind of study."

I think that sums your attitude up very clearly ....

"So you acknowledge that believing in religious text is more important to you than proper scientific research."

Indeed, God is omniscient, man, including man as scientist, isn't.

"Since you made it so obvious, I don't need to respond to the rest of your bs."

You are making it abundantly clear, you got the equivalent of a Communist country education. Condoleances.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Gavron88 Dobre herbata, enjoy, and in English one doesn't say "believing in religious text" but "believing in a religious text" - since definite and non-definite are the only alternatives, you can't be neutral between them.

Michael Eco

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "Sarfati didn't make a claim, but drew a conclusion, that Miller Urey conditions don't explain chirality in life"

That's a claim, Hans_George. Also, it's a logical fallacy called a strawman. Miller-Urey never claimed it was the origin of the chirality of life.

"Dishnoest trucnation of quote."

It's not dishonest, no. It's your premise.

"Thank you for showing how much YOU take YOURSELF for a victim ."

I'm not claiming I'm a victim. Just because you're losing badly and lying and making false accusations, it doesn't make me a victim. You're as impotent as you are dishonest.

"1) Stating there are hundreds of them doesn't amount to citing even one of them."

Nor do I have to. You're welcome to read the Bible yourself. I never met a Creationist who actually had.

"Sorry, but this time I have to call you a liar."

You're welcome to say that, but it's just another lie. There's no meaningful difference between Creatoinists and flat earthers. Two peas in a pod. Also, despite you trying to weasel back out of it, you were totally defending Rob Skiba. So I don't know why you expect anybody to take you seriously at this point. It's over.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Michael Eco "That's a claim, Hans_George."

It's a conclusion following from the premisses.

"Also, it's a logical fallacy called a strawman. Miller-Urey never claimed it was the origin of the chirality of life."

Strawman all on your side, Sarfati didn't pretend Miller and Urey had made the claim. He just points out that's one of the mysteries so far left unexplained (I think his count was 100 of them or so.

"It's not dishonest, no. It's your premise."

Not as the word is usually used.

"I'm not claiming I'm a victim. Just because you're losing badly and lying and making false accusations, it doesn't make me a victim. You're as impotent as you are dishonest."

You look quite a bit like a victim of your own bad temper right now.

"Nor do I have to. You're welcome to read the Bible yourself. I never met a Creationist who actually had."

So, your test for having read the Bible is knowing what you mean and agreeing with you? Very tactic. And leaves you free to bluff on your having done so.

"You're welcome to say that, but it's just another lie."

I already gave a good recipe of tea to your collegue, use it. You need it.

"There's no meaningful difference between Creatoinists and flat earthers. Two peas in a pod."

"No meaningful difference" doesn't mean they are synonyms. Thanks for admitting you were misusing the word.

"Also, despite you trying to weasel back out of it, you were totally defending Rob Skiba."

Against your points, not mine.

Btw, did you learn arguing in a backstreet of St. Petersburg or of Manila? Are you some ethnic minority whereever you are from?

"So I don't know why you expect anybody to take you seriously at this point."

I was arguing seriously, I don't require each and everyone to take me seriously, but I prefer if those arguing back are civil, whether they take me seriously or not. It's one thing to say "I laugh at you" and another to repeat it over and over showing how angry you are.

"It's over."

You're finished? F i n e ! Go and make yourself a good tea, then!

Two months

later, this was resumed:

Guilherme Castro

@Hans-Georg Lundahl carbon 14 isnt used in dating fossils as old as 70 million years, you can use potassium-argon dating or uranium 235, also the tissue was preserved ny something called iron cross linking which humans have observed for centuries

@Hans-Georg Lundahl no if fossils that are millions of years old contain carbon then theres contamination theres isotopes that are much more accurate in millions of years

@Hans-Georg Lundahl my god dude carbon 14 is and mever was used for dino fossils, its heavier isotopes that are used like uraniam 235 or uranium 234, potassium-argon dating and many more, you know why? Couse uranium isotopes take millions of years to decay that why those are more accurate

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Guilherme Castro I wonder if I didn't already adress these things here ...

The point is, as a Creationist, I'm free to consider K-Ar and U-Pb and Th-Pb as so much pretentious baloney, but the carbon 14 level is linked to the atmosphere. It doesn't change C14 content all that quickly, not from day to day.

Obviously, we both think this is not the whole story. I think C14 rose in the atmosphere since when the dinos breathed c. 5000 years ago, which is why it was so low and carbon dates so old as 40 000 years and you think it rose in the samples after they were buried. I'd agree for samples that only date to 20 000 years.

But you conclude this makes even carbon dates of 40 000 for coal "contaminated" - as you prefer the unprovable U and K amounts before decay ...

Guilherme Castro

@Hans-Georg Lundahl what are you talking about? No one needs to date coal its a fuel source those sont need dating and coal is purely carbon

Carbon 14 isnt created in the atmosphere its to heavy to be floating int the atmosphere, carbon 14 has a really short half life thats why its only used on samples believed to ne less then 50k years old, no scientist uses carbon 14 to date dino remains becouse carbon 14 is already gone by the time the bones fossilize, uranium 235 how ever takes hundreds of millions of years to decay.

Also i dont need to use dinossours to tell you the earth is 4.5 billion uears old, the existence of lead minerals in the soil is enough sense lead is the result of a chain reaction of contenious decay of larger and more unstabble atoms, the decay of uranium 238 over millions of years will and did end up with lead

@Hans-Georg Lundahl also if you have a t rex bone that is obviously older then 50k years and it shows to have carbon 14 then it has been contaminated and also the preservation of soft tissue like what dr shwitser found was a rare but natural process involving iron cross liking a process humans have used for centuries with formeldahyde and when turning hide into leather

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Guilherme Castro I just need to note one thing:

"Carbon 14 isnt created in the atmosphere its to heavy to be floating int the atmosphere,"

Heard of carbon dioxide?

I think you disqualified yourself in science, right now!

Appendix

St. Thomas Aquinas, S. Th. I P, Q 1, A 10, corpus

I answer that, The author of Holy Writ is God, in whose power it is to signify His meaning, not by words only (as man also can do), but also by things themselves. So, whereas in every other science things are signified by words, this science has the property, that the things signified by the words have themselves also a signification. Therefore that first signification whereby words signify things belongs to the first sense, the historical or literal. That signification whereby things signified by words have themselves also a signification is called the spiritual sense, which is based on the literal, and presupposes it. Now this spiritual sense has a threefold division. For as the Apostle says (Hebrews 10:1) the Old Law is a figure of the New Law, and Dionysius says (Coel. Hier. i) "the New Law itself is a figure of future glory." Again, in the New Law, whatever our Head has done is a type of what we ought to do. Therefore, so far as the things of the Old Law signify the things of the New Law, there is the allegorical sense; so far as the things done in Christ, or so far as the things which signify Christ, are types of what we ought to do, there is the moral sense. But so far as they signify what relates to eternal glory, there is the anagogical sense. Since the literal sense is that which the author intends, and since the author of Holy Writ is God, Who by one act comprehends all things by His intellect, it is not unfitting, as Augustine says (Confess. xii), if, even according to the literal sense, one word in Holy Writ should have several senses.

Debating Place or No-Place of Heaven with John Becknell

Christian Bible Studies: How can we know where heaven is located?
https://christianbiblestudies.quora.com/How-can-we-know-where-heaven-is-located-2

Submission accepted by

Marsha Meeks

John Becknell

Faithful to the Magisterium, striving to win the race.

Aug 21

How can we know where heaven is located?

Heaven according to theologians is not a place so to speak, but rather a state of being. Therefore one couldn't “walk” out of heaven and not be there. When one possesses the beatific vision, one is eternally in a state of bliss which can never be lost or located away from the person who is saved.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

December 21

“not a place”

That category of theologians does neither comprehend St. Thomas, nor Bishop Tempier.

John Becknell

December 21

Not sure of your point. Are you saying that heaven is rather a specific place that one can exit, that Heaven is merely a location?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

December 22

It is a specific place, above the fix stars. Other bonus with geocentrism is, I can place this not much further than one light day away.

One can exit heaven locally, as Christ will do when arriving at Armageddon and one can even exit heaven as to one’s state. You know, angels were created there and one third of them took a very final exit from heaven.

I agree with CSL (Anglican, nearly Protestant, though he was) that “merely” is a dangerous word. I don’t do “merely” this or if not “merely” the other, I often do both, unless there is a specific reason against one of the two.

John Becknell

December 22

Do you disagree with the Baltimore Catechism, which calls it a state of being? You are equivocating between calling heaven a state or a location with reference to the fallen angels in your reply. Note in the catechism, the question is, “what is heaven”, not where.

Geocentrism is junk science, and when you appeal to it, your particular eisegesis of Scripture is, like it or not, effectively discounted also. It's like I'm a rocket scientist who has calculated your path to Mars as I explain to you that this is the same path the elves took when they assisted Santa to the North Pole. I might be the best scientist in the world, but you're still not taking that trip.

[https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-4063e6e588aa3697c5eb32693ea86010-lq]

I answered

twice, hence two answers noted:

Hans Georg Lundahl

24.XII.2021

Christmas Eve

I would say the Baltimore catechism was sloppy on this point.

It was also influenced by a diffidence about the Galileo case.

Both St. Thomas and Bishop Tempier would have disagreed.

And I bet you can find elsewhere that the Baltimore catechism states that Satan was thrown down from Heaven, which proves my point.

You call geocentrism “junk science” when it is in fact primary observation. It is heliocentric arguments that are junk science as far as the implications are concerned.

And I didn’t quite get the implication of your comparison. Supposing Father Christmas exists (debatable but not out of the question) what would have stopped him from taking that path (if he was for instance an angelic immortal rather than a man)?

Hans Georg Lundahl

24.XII.2021

Christmas Eve

While it would have been more correct to say “what is beatitude” for Q 1395 with same definition, Baltimore catechism number 3 still has a corrective to your position, here:

Q. 1390. Will our bodies share in the reward or punishment of our souls?

A. Our bodies will share in the reward or punishment of our souls, because through the resurrection they will again be united to them.

~Baltimore Catechism #3 : Lesson 37~

Now a body needs a place, therefore Heaven is a place for beatitude, not just a state of it.

See also a couple of QQ which imply spatiality of Heaven:

Q. 418. Where is Christ in heaven?

A. In heaven Christ sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.

Q. 419. What do you mean by saying that Christ sits at the right hand of God?

A. When I say that Christ sits at the right hand of God I mean that Christ as God is equal to His Father in all things, and that as man He is in the highest place in heaven next to God.

~Baltimore Catechism #3 : Lesson 8~

Bart answered ...

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : Bart answered ... · Continuing with Leo Yohansen · With Leo Yohensen, Snappy Version · Leo Yohansen is Back · somewhere else : Apostles and St. Irenaeus · Where is the First Person if Moses and some Disciples wrote Torah and Gospels? · Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : Also under the video with GMS and Leo Yohansen

4 Misconceptions Christians Spread About The New Testament (feat. Dr. Bart Ehrman)
30th Nov. 2021 | Genetically Modified Skeptic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMc8FVlOZZg

O 0:30 What exactly are the qualifications of Bart Ehrman supposed to be?

New Testament scholar ... sure. Probably he does know a bit about textual variants found in manuscripts, and that two passages of John (adulteress and trinitarian version of witnesses above) are lacking from Sinaiticus.

But he also defends the kind of scholarship - if you like to call it that - where all tradition actually surrounding a work is suspect, while in fact, in general, the main clue to author assignation remains precisely tradition. And when I say "in general" I mean for non-NT works, like tragedies of Sophocles or comedies of Plautus.

I 0:55 Yes, it is.

Even supposing we had more than just one source, Josephus, who can have had Jewish reasons to misplace Quirinus in time, so we could be sure Quirinus actually arrived on the scene when Herod was already dead, the verb in Luke was "egeneto" and one could argue the word here actually for once, as previously in Classic Attic, means "became" and that Quirinus' first census was a reuse of one that had actually taken place before he came - so the meaning would be "this census [later] became Quirinus' first one" (because he reused it).

Roman administration had a charmingly amateurish side to it - at least that side would have been charming to the administrators, not always to those administrated. Before you go on a rant on Roman administration being so famous, did you know the guys who took taxes had already paid the tax in Rome, where it went to the highest bidder, and then they pressed the provincials in order to get back the investment and ideally (very usually) some more? (Roman roads are certainly great, but they were built by actual architects, not by the administrators personally).

II 1:05 "historic versus legendary"

The dichotomy supposes that history and legend are two different genres ... legend is usually history, often enough accurate history, and history can be inaccurate without being legendary, as happens by fake geekism (the guy Greene who wanted to do away with the name Hastings in the famous battle), simple mistakes, or propagandistic goals (including in modern academia, confer the case of Marcan priority).

It seems a countryman of mine or a Dane commented here and then took his comment away.

I'll cite before I answer:

// Lars Pallesen
The dichotomy supposes that history and legend are two different genres ... because they are. Very much so in fact. Noah's ark ain't history, you know. Or perhaps you don't? //

I very much don't "know" Noah's ark "not being history," I'am an eager defender of its historic accuracy, actually. And, that partly from pagan legends parallel to the Biblical account.

III 1:58 If you give me a choice between traditional view and a modern view dating from enlightenment or 19th C, I usually take the former one.

IV 2:29 How about the CHURCH named the Gospels, on authorising them, according to the authors the CHURCH knew to be such?

2:41 At least one of the Gospels does claim to be by an eyewitness, see John for Crucifixion. And before you start saying the author is claiming someone else was in his opinion the eyewitness, no, he lent his pen to those around him, so they can say "we know" - a bit more intricate, but actually same procedure as the Church naming the Gospels. And btw, that occasion, those borrowing the pen would have shared the hagiographer's inerrancy, but that's a theological note. For history, it's sufficient, they gave the attestation.

2:50 Third person narrative by participants is far from unknown, see Moses and Caesar.

V 3:11 A good competence in Greek does not argue they lived outside Palestine.

St. Luke did, and he visited Palestine to make the research.

3:23 Our Lord's followers all lived in Palestine - correct. Very correct for the period when they were so.

They all spoke Aramaic. Correct.

"we have no indication that any of them were educated"

Matthew = Levi = the tax collector. A Levite would be highly educated. He'd certainly know the Mosaic law in Hebrew. A tax collector would on top of that have a good grasp of the languages spoken by Romans.

John has more likelihood to be a Cohen, one of the lesser disciples, than a fisherman, one of the twelve, according to the research of Jean Colson CSS, who published his work L'Énigme du disciple que Jésus aimait in 1968. A Cohen would also be highly educated. And by the time he traditionally wrote the Gospel - namely after Patmos - he would have been outside Palestine for quite some time.

The argument seems so taken from the highly nationalistic 19th C. where fishermen in Europe very rarely left their home, unless they went to US or Canada ...

3:31 First, the John who was mentioned in Acts would have been a fisherman. Another John is mentioned as one among the Cohanim same passage.

Second, the text doesn't state the disciples were illiterate as a matter of fact, but that the priests saw them to be so. That is, they were reading the Torah habitually with the help of Targums in Aramaic, arguably many of which were provided by Jesus. Like Peter said his name was Kephas, and not that his name was, probably identic in meaning, Kaiaphas. Hence illiterate. As illiterate as someone speaking Cockney. Now, some people speak Cockney and do know how to read.

Third, the four fishermen disciples who were called first were not as literate as Matthew, see above. So, the argument assumes the chief disciples would be the most literate when they weren't.

3:36 Now seeing the constancy of Peter and of John, understanding that they were illiterate and ignorant men, they wondered; and they knew them that they had been with Jesus.

For "understanding" Vulgate has comperto quod - the illiteracy is the opinion of the men mentioned in verse 6 : Et Annas princeps sacerdotum, et Caiphas, et Joannes, et Alexander, et quotquot erant de genere sacerdotali.

It's obviously also about the Hebrew context and says nothing about their competence in Greek.

3:41 "they don't know the alphabet"

This is not quite the only meaning of "agrammatos" ...

Debates or just repartees:

I

the not so discrete wolf

I'm wanting an theist to answer this Question "what is the difference between me claiming that a bright pink invisible unicorn can cure everything because of a book said so and you claiming that a god (an invisible being said to of created anything) is real because one book said so?"

Hans-Georg Lundahl

This : the book we refer to, or rather books, were by their own first audience considered as history.

Now, facts can be historic and still badly analysed (confer pagans doing history in the Odyssey), but if a man tells a four day old corpse to come out and the former corpse does, what are chances there is even so no God?

Austin Stonecash

@Hans-Georg Lundahl so by this logic we have to accept all the supernatural claims of the Odyssey? Why does a book being written and believed by people mean it MUST be true?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Austin Stonecash There are some claims in the Odyssey that we need not accept, since only witness to them was Ulysses and he could have lied.

As to Athena, I don't know if "she" was guardian angel, demon, or perhaps a witch performing the shapeshift or several of these turn in turn. We need not accept she was born when Zeus had a headache and Hephaistos cured him by opening his head with a hammer.

I definitely would accept the claims of Iliad I, but I would assign to Apollon / Apollyon the role of a demon, same as the demon given the latter name in the Apocalypse.

I did not say "must be true" I said "historic" - some historic facts are fake, even though the overall text is historic. The reason is, it is way easier for a work essentially historic to be later on considered as fiction (especially when the style of writing and analysing historic events has changed) than for a work that is fictional to acquire the status of historic.

Fictional doesn't mean simply not true, it means not true but pretended to be true for well understood purposes of entertainment.

II

Tony Barreto

I am a happy Christian believer and I agree that these are all misconceptions. My faith does not depend on a literal interpretation of biblical stories. I believe the stories are divinely inspired and point to a transcendental reality that is fully compatible with rational thinking. If you are curious about this point of view, I would recommend starting with John Vervaeke and then checking out Jonathan Pageau. Best wishes.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"I believe the stories are divinely inspired and point to a transcendental reality that is fully compatible with rational thinking."

Why would rational thinking not be compatible with a literal interpretation of biblical stories?

III

Helen Ellsworth

Image someone telling a story about someone, 30, 40 years ago, how accurate would that be? ........ not very,

Hans-Georg Lundahl

The sequence of pregnant events arguably would be fairly accurate.

Besides, what is your rationale for putting that many years between events and Gospels?

IV

JiveDadson

The gospels occasionally give detailed accounts of characters' internal thoughts, in addition to events where there were no witnesses (other than Satan). In fiction, that is called the third person omniscient point of view.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Would you mind giving examples?

Matthew and Luke chapters 4, the disciples would obviously have taken Jesus' word for what happened with Satan.

Examples where Jesus tells what certain think, well, we would be accepting Jesus as omniscient, more than just a human eyewitness.

Motives of Judas - very clear in retrospect, after one knew of his treason.

Are there any others that would be a real issue?

Sam Miller

Not only that but there are parts to the story where no one is present. Mark has the resurrection narrative with women discovering the empty tomb and not telling anyone. How would Mark know this? How would anyone know this? That’s not first hand account eye witness testimony.

Omnitroph

@Sam Miller Not telling anyone IMMEDIATELY, but they would have afterwards.

Sam Miller

@Omnitroph not according to the gospel of Mark. Read the last chapter

Omnitroph

@Sam Miller "They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid."
Does it mean that they lived in constant fear for the rest of their lives and took their secret to the grave? No, of course not. It means that in the immediate aftermath of the event, they said nothing, only later sharing their story.

Robin Harwood

Satan told them.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Sam Miller I second Omnitroph.

We have the eyewitness testimony of the women, and arguably it ended with "we told no one" - problem solved.

Leo Yohansen

The gospels also present speeches that could never have been instantly written down or memorized to have been recalled later to be put into a gospel account. That's why the claim that the accounts had been inspired by the holy spirit is made even though there are no witnesses to that either.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Leo Yohansen That claim would have diverse merits for diverse speeches.

And remember, the environment was well versed in the art of instant memorisation. For instance, in John 3 a Pharisee of an older generation (not the one to which Jesus said over and over "woe to ye Pharisees" but the one which had been astonished in the Temple when He was twelve years) is there, and if Nicodemus became a Christian, he is obviously the one St. John knew the speech from. It is also a hypothesis that St. John was not one of the Twelve, but the host at the Last Supper, and that means he could have been the host of Jesus when Nicodemus came as well. By the way, St. Nicodemus, both RC and EO consider him a saint ...

But overall, it was a given in historiography at the time that the historiographer was giving his wording of what someone had said, often for embellishment, while it was also generally a given that the speaker sought to embellish his words when speaking - this means the actual wording in a historic text and when spoken need not strictly coincide.

The content would.

As the Gospel of John was originally written in Greek, only Matthew had an Aramaic or Hebrew first version, and Nicodemus arguably spoke Aramaic, the fact of translating is already a remove from actual wording, while giving same content.

Leo Yohansen

@Hans-Georg Lundahl 1. There is no such thing as the 'art of instant memorization'.

2. Trying to justify how the information of a fictional account had been transmitted by speculating about characters in the fictional account is useless. Especially when the characters in the account are made to use the title 'Rabbi' (John 3:2, 3:26) which hadn't been used until after 70 CE, when Rabbinic Judaism had been established decades after the time portrayed in the gospel accounts. In other words, no gospel accounts had been written before 70 CE and no supposed eyewitnesses would have been around after.

3. Speaking about actual wording going from spoken to written is already redundant as the words couldn't have been instantly memorized in the first place. No one had stood by listening to something like The Sermon on the Mount being spoken while instantly memorizing it as it was still being spoken.

4. There was no Aramaic first version of Matthew. The author of the gospel ascribed to Matthew had written the account in Greek and had used the gospel ascribed to Mark as his template. That's why the gospels ascribed to Matthew, Mark, and Luke, are known as the synoptic accounts.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Leo Yohansen "1. There is no such thing as the 'art of instant memorization'."

There certainly is. Twelve people take turns to hear a phrase, repeat it several times over, then their turn comes again - for instance. But the fact is, the more you try to memorise in situations where you have to get it instantly, the better you get.

"2. Trying to justify how the information of a fictional account had been transmitted by speculating about characters in the fictional account is useless. Especially when the characters in the account are made to use the title 'Rabbi' (John 3:2, 3:26) which hadn't been used until after 70 CE, when Rabbinic Judaism had been established decades after the time portrayed in the gospel accounts. In other words, no gospel accounts had been written before 70 CE and no supposed eyewitnesses would have been around after."

a) Would you mind telling me when the transition from fictional characters in the Church to actual characters in the Church occurred? You do admit that St. Irenaeus of Lyons is an actual person, right?
b) "which hadn't been used until after 70 CE," - I happen to think you are wrong, the title is older than Rabbinic Judaism.

"3. Speaking about actual wording going from spoken to written is already redundant as the words couldn't have been instantly memorized in the first place. No one had stood by listening to something like The Sermon on the Mount being spoken while instantly memorizing it as it was still being spoken."

If there are sufficient people taking turns or if the one preaching the sermon repeats it in front of the disciples sufficiently long, yes, there is.

"4. There was no Aramaic first version of Matthew. The author of the gospel ascribed to Matthew had written the account in Greek and had used the gospel ascribed to Mark as his template. That's why the gospels ascribed to Matthew, Mark, and Luke, are known as the synoptic accounts."

a) The actual reason is that they are very akin in storyline compared to St. John's Gospel;
b) the theory of Markan priority is unhistorical, an invention from 19th C. Germany, and useful from start for apostates like Bismarck;
c) and the historic tradition is that St. Matthew was the first Gospeller and that he first wrote in Aramaic before adding a Greek translation, incumbent on you to explain why the Church got this wrong.

V

Bart Stewart

Four questions answered out of about a million that could have been chosen. There are so many problems with Christianity you have to wonder how it got so big in the first place. Maybe it was this -- It became the official religion of the Roman Empire, and later the Holy Roman Empire, and at that point if you didn't express enthusiastic support for it, you got a visit from the King's men. The guys with the swords.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Not true more than half of the time.

And other truth : if you were too enthusiastic, you get a visit from the king's men, since he wasn't (heard of St. Thomas Becket?)

Bart Stewart

@Hans-Georg Lundahl "Not true more than half the time?" So, maybe 48.07% of the time? I'm not as precise as you but for the average person (Not some high-ranking cleric who got in trouble with an insane king) you had to be Christian back in the good old days, back when we were "great." Heretics were burned. That's why l say - No Theocracy in America!

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@Bart Stewart "you had to be a Christian" (under pain of death penalty) was true c. half the time. If you go between 313 and 1820, it was the latter half of the period that Inquisitors had any say.

By then Christianity was already well intrenched so most who could have rejected it without bad consequences didn't - meaning this initial success needs another explanation.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

calculated, added

I found out, this approach took me back to 1066 - so, make it less than the second half of the period.

VI 3:47 "written thirty to sixty years later by other people."

John was actually written up to seventy years later by ... an eyewitness.

But the others starting out only thirty years later and Matthew not being the St. Matthew who is described as Levi ... simple reconstruction, nothing like tradition from those likeliest to know.

3:50 "who had heard stories of Jesus in circulation"

• 1) the reconstruction without tradition goes on
• 2) the idea doesn't help to explain how these four became canonic
• 3) and contradicts what tradition says of each Gospel : I and IV by eyewitnesses, II by a secretary of one, namely St. Marc worked as secretary to St. Peter, III by one who was not content with stories in circulation but went to original eyewitnesses.

VII 4:19 Here we are into semantics.

Are Marcionites Christians?

While there were people unlike all claiming to be Christian today, more or less, like Marcionites and Gnostics, the people we have the Bible from are not these, and they are theologically united as Catholics, some would say Orthodox.

phil coombes

Only because the Council of Niceae decided which gospels were "true" & which not, & then set about enforcing the party line...

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@phil coombes er ... no.

The guys who had widely different NT canons were definitely out of the Church before the Council of Nicaea.

While it seems Marcionites still existed, they were not "a party" within the Christian Church then anymore than David Koresh was a party within the Roman Catholic Church a bit more recently.

phil coombes

@Hans-Georg Lundahl Having done a bit of reading *cough*, I take your point that the Biblical canon was not tidily assembled by an ecclesiastical Board of Directors (albeit with Divine assistance in the vetting) as popular myth would have us believe, but I do claim in mitigation that this seemed completely plausible, in the light of subsequent Church actions against those deemed guilty of daring to harbour different opinions, as exactly the sort of behaviour the Church Fathers were capable of indulging in...

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@phil coombes In fact:

• 1) there were somewhat differring canons East and West, and this was evened out by the councils of Rome and Carthage (some decades after Nicaea) - it didn't concern the Gospels but some in the East were not accepting the Apocalypse and some in the West were not accepting for instance Hebrews, if I recall correctly;
• 2) the Church actions you call subsequent are from the II Millennium.

VIII 4:53 I suppose Bart Ehrman is referring to Galatians chapter 2.

Especially verse 14. But when I saw that they walked not uprightly unto the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all: If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of the Gentiles, and not as the Jews do, how dost thou compel the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?

Now, while most of the commentators say St. Peter went somewhat too far in accomodation in discipline, some have claimed that St. Paul consistently calls him "Peter" and that the Cephas here mentioned is another guy.

Obviously there were things to sort out, and we do not have in the traditions of the papacy or the letters of St. Peter any reason to consider he permanently disagreed with St. Paul.

IX 5:01 Yes, I know 3rd and 4th C. had their fair share of heresies.

There was a Catholic Church that withstood these and later on withstood Protestantism and Modernism ...

X 7:57 Obviously Catholics did tend to accept either Apostolic Creed (West) or Didaché (East, I think) ... but not necessarily as on par with NT Scripture, notably in questions of liturgy.

It's not just a question of what you quote as certain truth, it is also about what you can read during Holy Mass.

XI 8:24 First, Matthew is from the thirties.

Second, the Church acted as a mass medium.

Third, "legend" doesn't mean "made-up"

"it takes no time to make up stories"

But it would take some time to get rid of those able to contradict them if false.

"all of us have stories about us that are not true, and often they are told the next day"

And nearly always by adversaries who take no time to check with you. Or at best loose supporters.

Church structure allowed to eliminate this potential source of errors (twelve had lived 3 years, 6 months with Jesus, and were chiefs etc.)

9:09 Bart, sounds like adversaries, not your best supporter club ... usually, I trust adversarial legend less than supporter legend.

10:07 Generally, if you were from Pompei, you were a citizen of Rome and Pompei. If you were from Galilee, you were a citizen of Galilee and a subject of Rome (this later changed).

St. Joseph would have creatively reinterpreted "from your own city" as what it would mean in a Hebrew context. As Herod's Judah was at the time a protectorate, this might have avoided him an actual census, if the Gospeller's "the whole world" is tongue in cheek about Augustus' wording.

10:12 "was there really a star"

Certainly not a naturally occurring one. I don't believe that miraculous stories are legendary accretions, in general, they could sometimes be outright lies, but they are not the kind of "genre shift" you get with legend transmission changing a story.

I kind of bet, none of the false stories about Bart's life contain any miracles.

What Does Biblical Inerrancy Extend To? Books and Subject Matters

I answer the books it extends to and the Vatican II sectarian Francis Marsden misanswers, I correct, what matters in extends to.

Q / A I

HGL on Christians say that the Bible is infallible. The Catholic Bible has 73 books; the Protestant 66 books. Which version is the infallible version?
https://catholicapologetics.quora.com/Christians-say-that-the-Bible-is-infallible-The-Catholic-Bible-has-73-books-the-Protestant-66-books-Which-version-is-5

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Catholic convert, reading many Catechisms

21.XII.2021

The Catholic Bible is inerrant in all of its books. And book parts.

What Protestants sometimes count as “14 Apocrypha” is not just 7 books that are in Catholic Bibles, but at least five of the other ones are book parts, for instance in Daniel.

The problem with diverse Protestant Bibles (yes, Luther Bible and King James are not identical) is not just lack of these books and book parts, but also in places mistranslations of the parts both parties agree on belong to the Bible.

I was answered twice

a and b.

a

John Raymond

22.XII.2021

Protestant religion is false, as 8s Vatican II Robber Church of JP II , Francis etc.

73 books, Duoay Rheims all the way.

Burn anything else. I burn with leaves…quite relaxing

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

I’ll sometimes use a Protestant Bible for details of Biblical history - but not for doctrine.

b

Scott Dowell

22.XII.2021

I will tell you all this,theirs not 1 religion in the holy bible.religion was man made,god never told you to be Catholic or baptist,or Mormon or what ever.theirs over 4,500 religions in the world and non of them are right,gods said this from the start be ye holy as I am holy!that's all he told you to be

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

He also told Christians to stay faithful to the apostles - not just their doctrine, but also their leadership.

That’s where the Church comes in.

Q / A II

Marsden on Christians say that the Bible is infallible. The Catholic Bible has 73 books; the Protestant 66 books. Which version is the infallible version?
https://catholicapologetics.quora.com/Christians-say-that-the-Bible-is-infallible-The-Catholic-Bible-has-73-books-the-Protestant-66-books-Which-version-is-4

Francis Marsden

37 yrs priest with Cambridge chemistry doctorate

21.XII.2021

Catholics say that the Bible is inerrant (without error) in all that pertains to our salvation.

The more extreme fundamentalists maintain that every word of the Bible is literally true about astronomy, geology and every bit of history.

This reveals a serious misunderstanding of the Biblical mindset and ancient Near Eastern literature.

It sets up a totally unnecessary clash between science and Christianity, which tends to discredit Christianity in popular secular opinion. It blocks many people from investigating Christianity seriously and accepting it.

I answered twice

first immediately below about the subject matter, and then once more, which is about Francis Marsden's tactics.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

21.XII.2021

“Catholics say that the Bible is inerrant (without error) in all that pertains to our salvation.”

That the Vulgate is so.

In the matter of original autographs, Catholics say that the Bible is inerrant in all things.

E. g. Vulgate and LXX disagree on timeline in Genesis 11. The Vulgate agrees with Ussher and the LXX (without the second Cainan) with the Roman Martyrology. This disagreement does not pertain to our salvation, therefore, even if LXX chronology is correct, the Vulgate is still inerrant in matters pertaining to the salvation.

“The more extreme fundamentalists maintain that every word of the Bible is literally true about astronomy, geology and every bit of history.”

You have just counted St. Robert Bellarmine and the Council Fathers of April 1546 as “more extreme fundamentalist” (I’m referring to Session IV).

Namely, if you take seriously “every word of the Bible” and therefore imply “whenever it touches on these subjects” which is not all of their subject matter.

“This reveals a serious misunderstanding …”

Oh, the Council of Trent seriously misunderstood things? When was the last general council YOU count as infallible, then? For me it was 1869–70 …. but you might consider people who are content with 2 or 3 councils more to your taste? I mean, Ephesus I fathers very certainly agreed with those of Trent as to their faith, speaking as to cultural history, but they had no occasion to make a shout out with anathemas on it!

“of the Biblical mindset and ancient Near Eastern literature.”

I’m waiting for details … St. James considered book of Job sufficiently historical to use the phrase “you have seen” about what one could read in the final chapters of it.

“It sets up a totally unnecessary clash between science and Christianity,”

I’d say it is Evolution belief that sets up an unnecessary clash with science rightly so called, along with its precursor Heliocentrism …

“which tends to discredit Christianity in popular secular opinion.”

There is a time - here or coming, but it will have been here before Doomsday - when not taking the mark of the beast will discredit Christians in popular secular opinion.

“It blocks many people from investigating Christianity seriously and accepting it.”

The culprits in their life are school compulsion and evolutionary indoctrination.

Answered twice

a and b.

a

Charles Kramer

21.XII.2021

Why does something have to be historical fact in order to be true?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

21.XII.2021

It doesn’t. That God is Three Persons is not historical, but unchanging, and still true.

However, Genesis 11 is not about eternals, it is, like Genesis in general, about historicals. Hence, due to its genre, it has to be historical fact and not historical falsehood to be true.

Charles Kramer

21.XII.2021

Let’s look at a bit differently and come from it through Shakespeare.

Why do we read or see Othello performed? It is to learn about how Venice governed its colonies in the late Renaissance? Or it is about racism, jealousy, and innocence?

Why do we read or see Macbeth performed? Is it to learn about inter-dynastic succession in late dark age Scotland? Or is Macbeth about ambition, power, corruption and guilt?

If no such person as Othello ever existed, would the play of bearing his name be any less true?

If Macbeth never existed or never actually did the things he is depicted doing in the play, would the play be any less true?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

21.XII.2021

First, Shakespear is, and is known to be, fiction. It was accepted by earliest audience as fictional in connexions like Twelfth Night.

Second, Shakespear made a lot of docufiction (more like Lanzmann’s Shoa or Wajda’s Katyn than like Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings). He took more than one tragedy from Holinshed (which features a version of Hamlet slightly different from the one in Saxo’s Gesta Danorum - Fenge has become Claudius). This is certainly true for Macbeth, and it is half of my answer on Shakespear. Duncan actually was succeeded by Macbeth in Scotland. The persons did exist.

He arguably spent lots of time at a Jesuit college or different ones in Italy. This means many of his plays set in Italy may be based on news stories from these small Italian towns. This seems however not to be the case with Othello, since the storyline was mainly from Un Capitano Moro in Hecatommithi by Cinthio, pseudonym for Giovanni Battista Giraldi (- see Wikipedia).

In plays like Othello, unlike Macbeth or Hamlet, you do seek moral truth, but not historic truth.

Now, the point is, the genre of Macbeth and Othello is “tragedy” and since sceptics have disputed the historicity of Greek tragedy characters like Hercules, this genre was understood to be partly fiction, partly docufiction, unlike the oldest Greek view in which it was only docufiction.

With Genesis we do not have the genre of tragedy. We have, both as to obvious things like you don’t put excessively boring detail in pure fiction, and as to reception over the centuries, and this means also in the New Testament, a genre assignment as “historic book”. I mentioned Genesis 11 because of the timeline it implies, but it also serves to give an example of the kind of boring detail you don’t put into works of fictional entertainment (after the initial story of Babel, that is).

One book which more often has been considered as a work of fiction, and in the Jewish community certainly has a solid reputation as such among the very recent faction of liberals, is Job. Now, in the New Testament, St. James treats Job as history. Fast forward to Pope St. Gregory I, the Great or the Dialogist. I’ll cite all of the first paragraph or chapter:

1. There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job. [Job 1, 1] It is for this reason that we are told where the holy man dwelt, that the meritoriousness of his virtue might be expressed; for who knows not that Uz is a land of the Gentiles? and the Gentile world came under the dominion of wickedness, in the same proportion that its eyes were shut to the knowledge of its Creator. Let us be told then where he dwelt, that this circumstance may be reckoned to his praise, that he was good among bad men; for it is no very great praise to be good in company with the good, but to be good with the bad; for as it is a greater offence not to be good among good men, so it is immeasurably high testimony for any one to have shewn himself good even among the wicked. Hence it is that the same blessed Job bears witness to himself, saying, I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls. [Job 30, 29] Hence it was that Peter extolled Lot with high commendation, because he found him to be good among a reprobate people; saying, And delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked; for he was righteous in seeing and hearing [so Vulg.], dwelling with them who vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds. [2 Pet. 2, 7.8.] Now he evidently could not have been vexed unless he had both heard and witnessed the wicked deeds of his neighbours, and yet he is called righteous both in seeing and in hearing, because their wicked lives affected the ears and eyes of the Saint not with a pleasant sensation, but with the pain of a blow. Hence it is that Paul says to his disciples, In the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine like lights in the world. [Phil. 2, 15] Hence it is said to the Angel of the Church of Pergamos, I know thy works,and where thou dwellest, even where Satan's seat is; and thou holdest fast My name, and hast not denied My faith. [Rev. 2, 13] Hence the Holy Church is commended by the voice of the Spouse, where He says to her in the Song of love, As the lily among the thorns, so is my love among the daughters. [Cant. 2, 2] Well then is the blessed Job described, (by the mention of a gentile land,) as having dwelt among the wicked, that according to the testimony borne by the Spouse, be might be shewn to have grown up a lily among thorns, for which reason it is well subjoined immediately after,

And that man was simple [so Vulg.] and upright.

Gregory the Great - Moralia in Job (Morals on the Book of Job) - Book I (Book 1) - online
http://www.lectionarycentral.com/GregoryMoralia/Book01.html

In other words, to us Christians it is forbidden to take even Job as fiction. How much more so then Genesis.

In other words, your obviously upcoming argument is based on mis-assignment of genre.

EDIT : a mis-assignment of genre that I knew from the Swedish Lutheran modernists I converted from, and absolutely not from the Polish priest I converted for, back when I converted in 87–88. It is sad if the Vatican II Sect imitates the modernism of the Porvoo Communion.

b

John Becknell

21.XII.2021

Not so. Genesis is general is not purely historical in nature. You are disagreeing with Augustine on this point. There are two creation stories in Genesis. One where man is created first, and then other, last. God is displaying two different meanings to the narrative whose focus isn't primarily historical.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

21.XII.2021

You haven’t read St. Augustine.

His point about the six days of Genesis chapter 1 does not extend to more than 3 terms : day, evening, morning.

Apart from that, Genesis 1 is a historic fact, and according to St. Augustine about the first one moment rather than the first 168 hours of the world’s history.

He may or may not have brought up apparent discrepancies between Genesis 1 and Genesis 2. I haven’t read that far in “De Genesi ad litteram libri XII”. There are more than one solution, and the first one is that Genesis 2:19 uses the pluperfect or a participle of active aorist (which right now I do not find in LXX online) : And the Lord God having formed out of the ground all the beasts of the earth, and all the fowls of the air, brought them to Adam to see what he would call them: for whatsoever Adam called any living creature the same is its name.

So, God didn’t necessarily create Adam before animals in Genesis 2 either.

That there is more than one sense is current, and that the historical is not ultimately the spiritually most important is also current - but it does not follow that Genesis is not historical. And for Genesis 11, from verse 10 on, it would be very difficult to find any justification other than history for the genealogy.

I was answered twice

and since this is already "b", I'll label the answers b i and b ij.

b i

John Becknell

21.XII.2021

Look at what you're doing Hans-Georg. You are attempting provisos to discount what Augustine explained as allegorical from Genesis to say he wasn't really doing that. That's clearly false even from your answer.

Let me ask you clearly. Do you believe in geocentrism and a six thousand year old creation?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

• 1. I have not pretended there is anything wrong with explaining the Genesis or any other part of OT history as allegorical. Even Antiochus Apiphanes is an allegory of the Antichrist.
• 2. This does not in any way, shape or form mean St. Augustine pretended the Genesis was not literal. You see, John Bunyan or Prudentius could write allegories in fictions arranged for that purpose, but God almighty can write allegories into a series of real events.
• 3. I am therefore not discounting what St. Augustine does, you are misconstruing it. Again, you have not read him. Case in point : if you had read City of God, you would know that from when Creation has taken place, he is very keen on Genesis being factual history.

Now, you posed two questions.

• 1. Yes, I believe in Geocentrism, among other things it solves the Distant Starlight paradox for a young universe (“parallax” being a misnomer for something else, like proper movements performed by angelic movers) AND it is something which St. Augustine very clearly defended in book I of De Genesi ad Litteram Libri XII.
• 2. No, I belive Adam had recently died 6000 years ago, I hold to the chronology of the Roman martyrology which is based on LXX and therefore arguably the one believed by St. Augustine, unless he preferred the longer also LXX based reckoning that has Christ born 5509 instead of 5199 after Creation. I also believe Christ is born 2957 after the Flood, and not 2346, as Ussher would prefer.

John Becknell

22.XII.2021

Oh my. Now of course, Adam and Eve were real people, as Pius XII explained. But who denies history, and real logic here? You might give the most wonderful defense of the faith to a large group as perhaps Sungenis would and someone in the back yells, “Yeah, but you're the one who believes the universe revolves around the earth, right?” And your effectiveness at proclaiming the true faith, or even a false one, is toast. That's what you've done here.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

24.XII.2021

Christmas Eve

Our effectiveness at proclaiming the true faith will be toast anyway when Antichrist gets his way on earth, and trying to back that date off by selling out more and more of the faith is just bringing it on even earlier.

As for me “denying history”, as for me “denying … real logic,” I’d like details. I think once you start giving them, my logic will have a bit more to add …

b ij

Jacqueline Quackenbush

22.XII.2021

Convert To Catholicism Here. Confirmed In July.

I Admit, I'm In Way Over My Head But:

The Fact That God Created Adam Before The Beasts Of The Earth And The Fowls Of The Air Is Evident From How The Sentence Is Structured

PAX

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

Not if it says “having created” …

Jacqueline Quackenbush

22.XII.2021

Convert To Catholicism Here. Confirmed In July.

I See Tha Words Having Formed. I Assume Thatz What Yor Referring To.

However, After Careful Review, I Still Maintain My Position And I Do So From The Appearance Of Tense (As In Past And Present) And On Tha Basis That Itz All One Sentence. Being In The Message Part Of The Question, I Am Unable To View Yor Comment. However, I See It Situated Something Like This:

Having Formed (Past Tense) The Beasts And The Fowl He Brot (Present Tense) Them Before Adam.

Ergo, Adam Already Existed

PAX

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

I am sorry, I think you should learn the tenses a bit better.

He already existed before God brought the beasts and fowl before him, but God had already created them before He brought them before him too.

And therefore the sentence doesn’t say Adam had been formed before they were formed, only that they had been formed before they were brought before him.

Quackenbush answered

but when I try to follow up the notification, I get no sight of the comment. Deleted? Numerically delayed upload? I don't know. Ah, now it appears:

Jacqueline Quackenbush

22.XII.2021

Convert To Catholicism Here. Confirmed In July.

I Disagree. In Fact, All My Senses Rail (sp??) Against Yor Claims. You'll Have To Do Better Than That. Surely I'm Worth A Better Explanation Than That.

It's Understood By The Eyes, The Brain, The Mind And The Heart That What Ive Stated Is True.

As Soon As One Reads The Sentence One Intuitively Understands Its Meaning.

Show The Sentence To Anyone With More Than A High School Education And They Will Say Tha Same.

Btw This Is Nothing Personal. I Enjoy The Odd Quibble About Things Such As These

PAX

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

I happen to have some university education, especially in Latin.

Formatis igitur Dominus Deus de humo cunctis animantibus terrae, et universis volatilibus caeli, adduxit ea ad Adam, ut videret quid vocaret ea : omne enim quod vocavit Adam animae viventis, ipsum est nomen ejus.

The point is, the earth beasts and birds had been formed from soil (de humo), and it had already happened (formatis is a past passive participle) before what follows. It doesn’t say it happened after what preceded.

I answered twice

as said above, and here is the other answer:

Hans-Georg Lundahl

21.XII.2021

Francis Marsden, under your other answer, I had affair with a Joe Smith, no qualifications given, here with Charles Kramer and with John Becknell, whose qualifications are also not given. Are their qualifications simply being Catholic (on your view) laymen you happen to know?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

And, I hope your acquaintance Jacqueline Quackenbush isn’t this one:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackie-quackenbush-87116870?trk=public_profile_samename-profile

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

Sorry, not … phew …. Québec city …

Hans-Georg Lundahl

22.XII.2021

Or that Charles Kramer isn’t this guy:

https://fr.linkedin.com/in/charles-kramer-062867

St. Thomas and Bishop Tempier

Was St. Thomas Aquinas ever accused of being a heretic?
https://www.quora.com/Was-St-Thomas-Aquinas-ever-accused-of-being-a-heretic

Two answers, plus comments from me:

A I

Mark White

Psychotherapist

13.XII.2021

I don’t think they would have canonized him if they did.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

14.XII.2021

There was a second document from Paris, 48 years later, just before canonisation, when a successor of Tempier went out of his way to clear him of suspicions. Namely the ones voiced in the original 1277 document.

A II

Catholic Apologetics

Francis Marsden

37 years a priest. Lived and studied six years in Rome.

Answered Sun

Some of his works* were condemned by the University of Paris, because he drew upon the philosophy of the pagan philosopher Aristotle.

In the Condemnations of 1277 Bishop Tempier rejected a list of 219 propositions drawn from the works of Aristotle, and some from Aquinas, who was accused by others of “trying to baptise Aristotle.”

Aquinas had died in 1274, and the condemnations of propositions drawn from his works was soon afterwards annulled. The Paris edict was directed against MA teachers at Paris who seemed too enamoured of Aristotelian and Averroist ideas in natural philosophy.

* Footnote

"Some of his works" is now emended to "Some sentences drawn from his works"./HGL

a

Hans-Georg Lundahl

14.XII.2021

Would you mind telling me which ones of the 219 propositions were supposed to be from St. Thomas Aquinas?

“the condemnations of propositions drawn from his works was soon afterwards annulled.”

48 years later, Stephen III (Tempier was Stephen II) issued a document, just prior to the canonisation of St. Thomas Aquinas, clearing him.

Would you mind telling me exactly where you get it from this document annulled any condemnation touching any of the 219 theses because that condemnation was, on your view, one of a thesis that St. Thomas subscribed to?

Like, did you ever read the second document?

I have read and reread a list of the 219 theses, under the title “theses que Parisius et in Anglia contempnati sunt” and obviously on the understanding that Stephen III did not annul any of the theses, just clear St. Thomas of suspicions of having held these.

Joe Smith

18.XII.2021

I’m not familiar with the document of Stephen III but Aquinas definitely held some of the condemned propositions. Examples of some of the condemned prepositions that he held are listed below. You would have to know very nothing about Aquinas’ theories on the individuation of forms to disagree with that claim that he held 42 & 43. Maybe they were all confirmed by Stephen to have not been held by Aquinas in some certain sense according to which they needed to be understood in order to be condemned.

Here are some condemned propositions that he held:

42A.1 That God cannot multiply individuals of the same species without matter. 43A. That God could not make several intelligences of the same species because intelligences do not have matter. [...]

50A. That if there were any separated substance that did not move some body in this sensible world, it would not be included in the universe. [...]

52A. That the separated substances, in so far as they have a single appetite, do not change in their operation.

53A. That an intelligence or an angel or a separated soul is nowhere.

54A. That the separated substances are nowhere according to their substance. – This is erroneous if so understood as to mean that substance is not in a place. If, however, it is so understood as to mean that substance is the reason for being in a place, it is true that they are nowhere according to their substance.

55A. That the separated substances are somewhere by their operation, and that they cannot move from one extreme to another or to the middle except in so far as they can will to operate either in the middle or in the extremes. – This is erroneous if so understood as to mean that without operation a substance is not in a place and that it does not pass from one place to another.

115A. That God could not make several numerically different souls.

116A. That individuals of the same species differ solely by the position of matter, like Socrates and Plato, and that since the human form existing in each is numerically the same, it is not surprising that the same being numerically is in different places.

146A. That the fact that we understand less perfectly or more perfectly comes from the passive intellect, which he says is a sensitive power. – This statement is erroneous because it asserts that there is a single intellect in all men or that all souls are equal. 147A. That it is improper to maintain that some intellects are more noble than others because this diversity has to come from the intelligences, since it cannot come from the bodies; and thus noble and ignoble souls would necessarily belong to different species, like the intelligences. – This is erroneous, for thus the soul of Christ would not be more noble than that of Judas.

162A. That the science of contraries alone is the cause for which the rational soul is in potency to opposites, and that a power that is simply one is not in potency to opposites except accidentally and by reason of something else. 163A. That the will necessarily pursues what is firmly held by reason, and that it cannot abstain from that which reason dictates. This necessitation, however, is not compulsion but the nature of the will.

169A. That as long as passion and particular science are present in act, the will cannot go against them

Source*

https://eclass.uoa.gr/modules/document/file.php/PHS325/__Philosophy_in_the_Middle_Ages__The_Christian__Islamic__and_Jewish_Traditions.pdf

* Footnote

The source is an anthology of medieval texts either by philosophers, or in the case of the 1277 condemnations, at least relevant for philosophy.

In these, the numbering of "Mandonnet" is followed and he wrote Siger de Brabant et l'averroïsme latin au XIIIme siècle, volumes 1 à 2, in 1911.

I think it is safe to say, even if he was a dominican, that Pierre Mandonnet (who is also secondary literature in French and not in English) can stand some correction by for instance D. Piché or Louis Valcke writing 88 and 89 years later.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

18.XII.2021

First, you quote a document that spends 12 pages on the 1277 condemnations. It ends with John Buridan and that’s on 707 or 708.

My source for the condemnations is the full list by David Piché, in a book, from the appendix of which I took the version as condemned in England:

Département de philosophie (de Montréal, David Piché)

I also looked at an online resource:

https://www.erudit.org/fr/revues/ltp/2000-v56-n1-ltp2166/401278ar.pdf

And from my comment on my index for the English version, I noted from that link (hoping it still stands) :

Cependant, un retournement de perspective n'allait pas manquer de se produire. Redoutant cette dérive fidéiste qui s'était amorcée suite à l'intervention de Tempier, le pape Jean XXII allait réhabiliter la doctrine thomiste par la canonisation, en 1323, de Thomas d'Aquin, suivie, deux années plus tard, de la levée, par Etienne Bourret, de tout interdit que cette doctrine avait pu encourir de par la condamnation de 1277, comme il a été dit ci-dessus.

Whether or not John XXII actually was motivated by a mistrust of Tempier’s fideism or not, it gives his actions : he makes Stephen III Bourret lift any forbidding which St. Thomas’ doctrine could have incurred by the condemnation of 1277. THIS MEANS, he does not lift the condemnation of the propositions themselves.

Now, your examples.

42A.1 That God cannot multiply individuals of the same species without matter. 43A. That God could not make several intelligences of the same species because intelligences do not have matter. [...]

I defy you to actually find this verbatim in St. Thomas. What he says is, angels cannot be individually different from each other, other than by being of different species, because they do not have matter. He does not say “God cannot” or “God could not” and I just checked.

The substance of the angels absolutely considered (Prima Pars, Q. 50) (Article 4)

50A. That if there were any separated substance that did not move some body in this sensible world, it would not be included in the universe. [...]

While St. Thomas actually says that angels usually do move bodies, and their presence is one of activity, he does neither say that they would not exist without doing this, nor that they would suddenly cease to be in a specific place if ceasing to move bodies.

52A. That the separated substances, in so far as they have a single appetite, do not change in their operation.

I think Tempier and the guys you cited would have taken this from a “videtur quod” section. God certainly in St. Thomas does perform diverse operations on His creation, and angels certainly do diverse operations too, and this both in St. Thomas and in general in the sources of the faith.

53A. That an intelligence or an angel or a separated soul is nowhere.

Again, St. Thomas specifically denies this. He says that separated souls are in Heaven, in Hell, in Purgatory, and for infants dying without baptism, in Limbo.

54A. That the separated substances are nowhere according to their substance. – This is erroneous if so understood as to mean that substance is not in a place. If, however, it is so understood as to mean that substance is the reason for being in a place, it is true that they are nowhere according to their substance.

And St. Thomas’ thought specifically fulfils the “if however” when he discurses on this.

55A. That the separated substances are somewhere by their operation, and that they cannot move from one extreme to another or to the middle except in so far as they can will to operate either in the middle or in the extremes. – This is erroneous if so understood as to mean that without operation a substance is not in a place and that it does not pass from one place to another.

Obviously, a soul being punished is certainly in a place where he is being punished, and it would certainly have been transferred there from God’s tribunal, even without operating herself.

The 12 pages you cite seem very shallow on St. Thomas.

115A. That God could not make several numerically different souls.

St. Thomas clearly thinks God does make several numerically different souls, by occasion of them being created for several numerically different bodies that are individuated by diverse matter.

116A. That individuals of the same species differ solely by the position of matter, like Socrates and Plato, and that since the human form existing in each is numerically the same, it is not surprising that the same being numerically is in different places.

I do not recognise this one from either Tempier or St. Thomas, but St. Thomas would not agree the latter part, he would consider Socrates and Plato numerically different, but specifically the same. So, NOT the same being numerically.

In the numbering I have from Piché, the original 116 from Tempier 1277 and the VIII:15 in the English version reads: Quod anima est inseparabilis a corpore, et ad corruptionem harmonie corporalis corrumpitur anima. If we have different numberings, it is fairly clear that the condemnations were copied more than once and therefore remained in force for a long time or at least perceived as remaining in force for a long time.

146A. That the fact that we understand less perfectly or more perfectly comes from the passive intellect, which he says is a sensitive power. – This statement is erroneous because it asserts that there is a single intellect in all men or that all souls are equal.

I do not find the Latin for these words in skimming over chapter VIII, errors about the soul or intellect.

Capitulum VIII

The number 146 in my version is XVI:3, namely this:

Quod possibile uel impossibile simpliciter, id est, omnibus modis, est possibile uel impossibile secundum philosophiam.

Capitula XV - XVIII

My number 147 is in VI, errores de Deo:

Quod impossibile simpliciter non potest fieri a deo, uel ab egente alio. -Error si de impossibili secundum naturam agitur.

Collectio errorum in Anglia et Parisius Condempnatorum

Your 162 is my 173:

18 (173). Quod scientia contrariorum solum est causa quare anima rationalis potest in opposita ; et quod potentia simpliciter una non potest ad opposita, nisi per accidens et ratione alterius.

I don’t think St. Thomas would have said this, but do you have a clue?

The 163 is however identical.

15 (163). Quod uoluntas necessario prosequitur quod firmiter creditum est a ratione : et quod non potest abstinere ab eo quod ratio dictat. Hec autem necessitatio non est coactio, set natura uoluntatis

And this is obviously not what St. Thomas thought either. It is what Socrates and Epictetus thought. A pretended condemnation of Thomism turns out to be a condemnation of Stoicism, but St. Thomas was no Stoic.

169A. That as long as passion and particular science are present in act, the will cannot go against them

Is my IX:2 = 129, namely: 2 (129). Quod uoluntas, manente passione et scientia particulari in actu, non potest agere contra eam.

Capitulum IX

I don’t doubt that Tempier may have thought St. Thomas said this, but would you mind telling me where he actually did so?

Joe Smith

18.XII.2021

I misspoke to some degree, but unless you can identify the actual source of the statement condemned in #42, I have a hard time believing that it wasn’t originally supposed to condemn a position that Aquinas held.

Is your demand that the statements be found in Aquinas’ works verbatim? Are the condemnations supposed to be verbatim quotations from some particular text? In that case, regarding the two examples that I specifically pointed out as things I was confident that Aquinas believed, I do not believe that they were verbatim quotations or that they were things that he would have said.

In the Summa Theologia, 1st Part, q25, Article 3, he says,

Therefore, that which implies being and non-being at the same time is repugnant to the idea of an absolutely possible thing, within the scope of the divine omnipotence. For such cannot come under the divine omnipotence, not because of any defect in the power of God, but because it has not the nature of a feasible or possible thing. Therefore, everything that does not imply a contradiction in terms, is numbered amongst those possible things, in respect of which God is called omnipotent: whereas whatever implies contradiction does not come within the scope of divine omnipotence, because it cannot have the aspect of possibility. Hence it is better to say that such things cannot be done, than that God cannot do them. Nor is this contrary to the word of the angel, saying: "No word shall be impossible with God." For whatever implies a contradiction cannot be a word, because no intellect can possibly conceive such a thing.

So no, because as he says there, “it is better to say that such things cannot be done, than that God cannot do them.,” I think that you are right that nobody is going to be able to find a verbatim quotation saying

42A.1 That God cannot multiply individuals of the same species without matter.

43A. That God could not make several intelligences of the same species because intelligences do not have matter.

But are you disputing that the claim that “Individuals of the same species can be multiplied without matter,” is a word that is possible with God, in the sense of “word” used in Aquinas’ statement that, “"No word shall be impossible with God." For whatever implies a contradiction cannot be a word, because no intellect can possibly conceive such a thing”?

Aquinas would have rejected the claim that “That God can multiply individuals of the same species without matter.” Do you dispute that?

In some of the condemned statements, there is a distinction made explaining the sense in which they are condemned. For example,

54A. That the separated substances are nowhere according to their substance. – This is erroneous if so understood as to mean that substance is not in a place. If, however, it is so understood as to mean that substance is the reason for being in a place, it is true that they are nowhere according to their substance.

I ask non-rhetorically, what position was being condemned it statement 42, that did not need a comparable distinction? Do you think that the proposition being condemned means something like “Individuals of the same species can be multiplied without matter, but God cannot do it?” Did somebody actually teach that?

I’m not going to go through every proposition that I listed above. Obviously, I just copied them all out of another work and pointed out what I thought were some particularly good examples. Maybe some of them aren’t directed at any position that Aquinas held.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

19.XII.2021

IV Lord's Day of Advent

"I have a hard time believing that it wasn’t originally supposed to condemn a position that Aquinas held."

There is more like St. Thomas an Bishop Tempier each stepping up to a line.

St. Thomas says that angels naturally cannot be individuated other than by difference of species. Bishop Tempier insists that God could, if so, have created the world in a different manner. Duns Scotus will later say that God did precisely that, God individuates by heceitas. This is arguably where Bishop Tempier is leaning, but he doesn't insist (here) on it as long as it is admitted that God could have done otherwise.

So, Bishop Tempier is clearly holding his eyes on what St. Thomas said, but he's not condemning it in and of itself, he's just adding "go no further".

"Is your demand that the statements be found in Aquinas’ works verbatim?"

For his works to be condemned, either verbatim or with logically stringent conclusion from verbatim statement.

Following your discussion after this, if St. Thomas had said that it was a contradiction in terms to have angels individuated other than by difference of species, that would on St. Thomas' view have implied that it did not fall under divine omnipotence. But if you look up Bishop Tempier, he condemns the idea ... 3 (146). Quod possibile uel impossibile simpliciter, id est, omnibus modis, est possibile uel impossibile secundum philosophiam.

In other words, St. Thomas has on this view a refuge in this clause, as having uttered an impossibility according to philosophy which however is not impossible for God.

"Aquinas would have rejected the claim that “That God can multiply individuals of the same species without matter.” Do you dispute that?"

Whether he would or would not have that, he did in fact not. And it is not the least sure he would have rejected Scotist heceitas if presented with it.

"Do you think that the proposition being condemned means something like “Individuals of the same species can be multiplied without matter, but God cannot do it?” Did somebody actually teach that?"

No, but it means "individuals of the same species cannot be multiplied without matter AND not even God can do it" and the latter, St. Thomas did not add. Perhaps he would if he had followed out his thought, and here is where Bishop Tempier put up a warning sign for those who would.

Now, a ban is to be taken only on the proposition actually given or strictly synonymous, unless a judge goes out of his way to apply it to a similar and related case he thinks logically leads to an already condemned position, and this judge doing that is not Bishop Tempier, because he did not.

"Maybe some of them aren’t directed at any position that Aquinas held."

I would say, individuation without matter is the most crucial where we can safely say St. Thomas and Bishop Tempier disagreed, but this does not mean the latter actually condemned the former. Btw, I happen to lean, like I presume Bishop Stephen II did, to Scotist heceitas.

Joe Smith

19.XII.2021

IV Lord's Day of Advent

Duns Scotus will later say that God did precisely that, God individuates by heceitas. This is arguably where Bishop Tempier is leaning, but he doesn't insist (here) on it as long as it is admitted that God could have done otherwise.

I do not believe that Aquinas thought that angels could have been individuated other than by species if God had created the world otherwise. I think that he considered it something that could not have been done. And I do not think that his position is logically compatible with Scotus’ position. But I’m not really ready to compose a post that presents a robust argument against someone who thinks that this is a misreading of Aquinas. I could have done so at one time but it’s been long enough since I revisited those texts that I’m not able to defend my position now without spending more time than I’m willing to on a Quora post.

If you really think that Aquinas and Tempier are both stepping up to the same line without actually crossing it, and that Scotus resolves this issue without advancing a position that is incompatible with Aquinas’ position, I’d ask whether you know of any secondary literature, published in English, that you would recommend on this topic?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

19.XII.2021

IV Lord's Day of Advent

In brief resumé : Scotus and the position of Aquinas are basically incompatible.

However, while Tempier leaned to what Scotus later did, he did not oblige St. Thomas (retrospectively) to join Scotus. And what St. Thomas thought does not change that his actual words were in themselves not condemned.

No, I don’t know secondary literature in English, since I suppose you don’t count me …

b

Hans-Georg Lundahl

14.XII.2021

“Some of his works were condemned by the University of Paris,”

Which works?

I have only read the 219 theses, and in the version “theses que Parisius et in Anglia contempnati sunt” the “errores de prima causa sive Deo” (which start the systematics) are chapter VI, meaning things like enumeration of authors were in chapters I to V of Tempier’s original or the derived English Catholic document.

Francis Marsden

14.XII.2021

Amended accordingly. I’m sure you will give us the details!

b i

Hans-Georg Lundahl

14.XII.2021

You amended to “Some sentences drawn from his works” and you have still not said which ones.

The question was insofar genuine as reading a list of 219 propositions does not qualify me to state where each is from.

But it is also in a way rhetorical. My familiarity with St. Thomas (I have some) doesn’t allow me to verify that any of them were directly drawn from positions held by St. Thomas. Individuation of angels, they didn’t see eye to eye, but there is no direct confrontation. St. Thomas speaks of what God did, namely individuate angels by different species. Bishop Tempier condemns that He could not have done otherwise. Something St. Thomas didn’t state.

So, if you have proof positive that lots of the sentences were from St. Thomas, I’d like to see it. I don’t think you have that.

b ij

Hans-Georg Lundahl

15.XII.2021

I was just checking chapter XI of the “English” (in Anglia) version, and no, the position that “newness of the world” cannot be known except by faith is not one of the condemned propositions.

Capitulum XI

Obviously St. Thomas and Bishop Tempier agreed that the faith tells us and this is in fact also true and perfectly compatible with reason, that the world had a beginning.

Here is an overview over all chapters:

Index in stephani tempier condempnationes

I don’t think you can trace much to St. Thomas, unless you search in the “uidetur quod” sections of the articles. In other words, what the saint argued against, the bishop condemned.

My best clue to why Bishop Tempier mentioned St. Thomas (brother Thomas from Aquino) prior to the enumeration of 219 errors is, he had no clue how the questio form worked. Apart from that, the main doctrinal culprits were Siger of Brabant and Boethius of Dacia.

b iij

Hans-Georg Lundahl

16.XII.2021

I still see “and some from Aquinas” plus the idea that those not were mainly from Aristotle rather than Paris University Averroists …

You have neither followed up my suggestion to correct that, nor documented me as being wrong.

And I still see “the condemnations of propositions drawn from his works was soon afterwards annulled,” when the fact is that only his name was removed from the condemnation, while the 219 propositions remained condemned.

Why? Slow in fact checking my corrections, or not interested in taking anything except abject submission on the matter from me?

b iu

Hans-Georg Lundahl

17.XII.2021

W a i t … I begin to see what you might mean with “I’m sure you will give us the details” … referring to my past and present carreer as promoter of angelic movers.

Capitulum XII

English XII:1 and original from Paris 92 : Quod corpora celestia mouentur a principio intrinseco, quod est anima ; et quod mouentur per animam et per uirtutem appetitiuam, sicut animal. Sicut enim animal appetens mouetur, ita et celum.

English XII:6 and original from Paris 213 : Quod natura que est principium motus in corporibus celestibus est intelligentia mouens. -Error, si intelligatur de natura intrinseca, que est actus uel forma.

This very explicitly allows for the position of St. Thomas Aquinas, that an intelligence = angel is moving celestial bodies as extrinsic mover.

In other words, if you state the angel of the Sun moves the Sun as I move my own feet, you fall afoul of Bishop Tempier, but if you state he moves the Sun as I move a bike with my feet, you are safe.

This is why the 219 propositions could remain condemned even after St. Thomas was fully exonerated.

When some people have reason to make use of Church history (as you might if you want to assess whether my position on angelic movers is orthodox or heretic), it is kind of somewhat preferrable if they get the Church history correct.

EDIT : I look up my comments on the chapter and see St. Thomas was, for his own part, indifferent as to whether angels move stars one way or the other. But it seems I either misread or the text was changed.

c

Hans-Georg Lundahl

14.XII.2021

“and Averroist ideas in natural philosophy.”

St. Thomas was as eager to refute Averroism as Bishop Tempier to condemn their errors.

d

Joe Smith

18.XII.2021 Saying that they were condemned “because he drew upon the philosophy of the pagan philosopher Aristotle,” is overly reductive. Great theologians had been drawing from pagan philosophers since the early church. It’s not as though that alone would have been sufficient. And if it had, then a massive portion of his work would have been condemned, not just a few scattered statements.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

21.XII.2021

Not agreeing any were in fact condemned, but the gist of your comment is on the right side.

However, it’s not just that, but also, if any were condemned, they would be also very few among the 219 propositions.