Re: ANE cosmology; was : A profound disturbance found in Yak butter.

On Mon, 05 Jun 2006 06:50:39 -0400 <glennmorton@entouch.net> writes:
>
>
> >I know that the claim that everything can be said in any language
> is
> >presented as a truism. It's probably true in all languages spoken
> by
> >westernized nations. One gets by with the 10,000 words in French,
> thanks
> >to the Academie, or the million available in English, where there
> are no
> >official restrictions. In tribal languages, the routine matters of
> life
> >can be communicated: food or poison, tasty or yucky produce no
> problems.
> >But there is no way that a tribe whose total numerical vocabulary
> >consists of one, two, many can express even elementary arithmetic.
> I'm
> >recalling a study of a couple such Amazonian tribes. The children
> were
> >learning arithmetic, but in Portuguese. Beyond such restrictions,
> the
> >mere availability of terminology is not necessarily enough. Imagine
> a
> >person with an undergraduate degree in poly sci and a J.D., or one
> with a
> >doctorate in English lit. How will they follow a detailed physical
> >lecture without being versed in calculus?
>
> BAsically, I said, that every concept could be expressed in any
> language, but one
> would clearly have to stretch some aspects of some languages. In
> the example above
> one can do math by stating one, two, one-and-two-many(or a many of
> one and two),
> two-and-two many, etc to convey the concept of counting.
>
Sorry, Glenn, but this won't work. "More" is not equivalent to 3, but
covers everything above 2. You can;t add more + 1. We have an echo of
this in the comparison of adjectives, where you have to have added
information to answer, after a declaration that an item is the best,
"Best among how many?"

> But languages lacking numbers do math in a practical sense:
>
> "As has been noted, the Tawaudi people appear to lack
> counting words, and barter by one-to-one correspondence. But is
> it a lack of need for counting that has inhibited language
> development, or has a lack of words inhibited thought?
> Considering the flexibility of living languages, it is difficult
> to see why words for 'threeness,' 'fourness,' etc., would not be
> invented on need. Yet later evidence suggests that bilingual
> school children alter their behavior depending on the language
> used in the test situation (either the language of instruction or
> the vernacular). The second explanation relates to logical
> necessity. There is much mensuration in village life--in house
> construction, for example. This is normally carried out by
> matching length A to position B or by measuring by some ad hoc
> unit. It was not usual for a man to argue that because X fitted
> somewhere before, it must fit there again. Thus the mensuration
> is empirical, pragmatic, and ad hoc. No universal units of
> measurement appear to be involved, and there seems to be a
> powerful connection between the ability to handle measurement and
> the achievement of conservation of length (especially in
> bilinguals)." ~ Max Kelly, "Papua New Guinea and Piaget--An
> Eight-year Study," in Pierre R. Dasen, Piagetian Psychology, (New
> York: Gardner Press, Inc, 1977), p. 184
>
>
One to one equivalence is not math (or maths).
>
>
>
>
> >
> >I can't vouch for the story, but I'm pretty sure that residents of
> the
> >Sahara will have more understanding of trucks than of boats.
> >Additionally, in an area where streams are small, they will be
> restricted
> >to dugout or bark canoes. Paddles are not rudders. If they use
> rafts,
> >sweeps are not rudders, either.
>
> Having been an avid canoeist in my youth, the paddle is used as a
> rudder all the
> time. It is one of the basic strokes needed to control the boat.
>
Then rowing with one oar to turn the boat makes the oar a rudder? A
paddle has to give the single paddler complete control of the canoe, but
that does not make it a brake, reverse gear, rudder, etc. Recall "If I
call the tail of a dog a leg, ..."
>
>
> >
> >How precise would God have to be to avoid the charge of misleading?
>
> Have you read my examples put on this list within the past few days?
> I keep
> answering the same question for different individuals. As I have
> said many times,
> not very. I have said, God doesn't have to write 7th grade science
> texts. God
> doesn't have to tell all, but is it too much to ask that when he
> does inspire man
> to write something that he not inspire total falsehood? Couldn't he
> have inspired
> out of the mud came life? Couldn't he have inspired, the earth is
> extremely old?
> That would be about it.
>
Within the context of antiquity, God did say that the earth is very old.
Much later the term for the largest number in Greece was "muriad" or
myriad. I would say that usually is simply conveyed the notion that the
number was too big to count. It took the genius of Archimedes to talk
about myriads of myriads with specific numerical reference. Additionally,
how is "out of the mud came life" "more true" than "Let the earth bring
forth grass, ..." With the former you'd object that it was either next to
a vent or in a warm pool.

> Let me reverse the question. How WRONG does God have to be before
> you quit giving
> him A+'s for his ability to communicate theological truth?
>
> It seems to me that no matter what nonsense we find, many of you all
> claim it is
> still teaching great theological truths. Is there any level of
> wrongness that
> would result in the conclusion of 'This is utterly poppycock?'
>
> This is why a verification of something God says about nature is
> important, (NOT A
> SCIENCE BOOK FOR THE 10 millionth time), So the next person who
> again suggests that
> I am asking for Hawkings and Ellis' book to be dumped into the Bible
> will be told
> that they don't have any reading ability. FRankly, David, I don't
> think you do
> either because I have said the same thing to you on numerous
> occasions, but you
> continually ignore what I say.
>
> I
> >heard John Walton say that the ancient Hebrews and Jews held that
> >everything that happened in nature was the action of God.
>
> Don't CAlvinists think this today? What is so odd about that
> belief?
>
Even Calvinists acknowledge secondary causes. There is a difference from
first cause.

> This was
> >clearly the notion of others in antiquity.
>
> You forget the modern adherents of God's sustenance of the universe.
>
>
> Thunderbolts were thrown by
> >Zeus, Jove or Thor, for example. Is this strictly true, or how far
> should
> >God have gone in correcting the notion?
>
> So, are you saying that you have scientific evidence that God isn't
> in control of
> anything? Why are you a CHristian then?
>
> My point is that belief in God's control is not science and is not
> capable of
> verification or refutation. YOu have made a category mistake by
> assuming that you
> can do something to verify God's control or lack there of(and thus
> make it
> science).
>
> So, please tell me what experiment you have carried out to answer
> the question of
> God's control of the universe? When did that issue become
> scientific rather than
> mere belief? If it is a matter of science, then God should have
> corrected, if not,
> then you have produced a shiny bright red herring.
>
Don't you remember that I'm a philosopher?
Dave
Received on Mon Jun 5 17:14:40 2006