Religion IS crazy!

[bellenuit]

Cynic - no, I had not failed to notice you are trying to draw a correlation between the remaining 23 ribs and the 23 chromosomes contributed by the male and the female, but I think you are drawing rather a long bow!! You are trying to manipulate data to fit neatly into your hypothesis.

More than that, there is no 23 anywhere. Adam's contribution was 1 rib, not 23. If the monk was mistranslating, where is he getting this magical 23 from. Both man and woman have 24 ribs, 12 pairs of two. If the monk misunderstood rib when chromosome was meant, then it still does not explain why the Bible only mentions taking just 1 item of this chromosome to form a woman. Was that a mistranslation too?

Your mystical number is 1 and I am sure there are millions of genetically related examples of 1 of some item being contributed or passed on to subsequent generations that would be far more relevant than what you are alluding to.

 

[Chris45]

My belief is that the passage in question was originally intended to convey something akin to the following:
"Through removal of an item from the 23 components of the man a woman was fashioned."
The ease with which such a statement could be mistranslated into things written in current day biblical texts will undoubtedly be apparent.

Cynic, would you kindly give the Biblical reference behind your quote. I only know Genesis 2:21-23.

All normal humans, both male and female, have 12 pairs of ribs and 23 pairs of chromosomes. The only difference is in the 23rd pair of chromosomes, the sex chromosomes. The Y chromosome in males is shorter than the corresponding X chromosome in females, but both males and females have the same number of ribs and the same number of chromosomes.

However ... in the American Journal of Medical Genetics in 2001, two professors published a letter which describes their hypothesis that Genesis 2:21-23 doesn’t mean Eve came from one of Adam’s ribs, she came from his baculum.

The baculum is a bone found in the penis of many placental mammals. It is absent in the human penis, but present in the penises of other primates, including our nearest evolutionary neighbors, the gorilla and chimpanzee. The bone aids sexual intercourse by maintaining sufficient stiffness during sexual penetration.

The authors then continue to support their argument with alternate translations of the Hebrew word for “rib” (which they say could mean “support beam”) and claim the raphe of the human male scrotum is what Genesis 2:21 is referring to when it says “The Lord God ... closed up the flesh.” My knowledge of Biblical Hebrew is a bit rusty but mistranslation could indeed be the clue here!

So ... God took the baculum from Adam, and created Eve, and then gave us Viagra to compensate.

http://cabinetmagazine.org/issues/28/gilbert_zevit.php

 

[Chris45]

TV news report: 11 year old boy reincarnated. The mystery deepens!



Would anyone like to offer an alternative explanation?

 

[bellenuit]

A priest shows up at a monastery where the monks spend their time making copies of ancient books. The priest goes to the basement of the monastery saying he wants to make copies of the originals rather than of others' copies so as to avoid duplicating errors they might have made. Several hours later the monks, wondering where their new friend is, find him crying in the basement. They ask him what is wrong and he says "the word is CELEBRATE, not CELIBATE!"

 

[bellenuit]

TV news report: 11 year old boy reincarnated. The mystery deepens!



Would anyone like to offer an alternative explanation?

Here is one and it seems a lot more plausible than your reincarnation theory. TV shows don't always give the complete story, not when ratings are their main motivation. This relates to the same story shown on ABC (US) TV which I have not seen, but it is interesting that both omit the museum visit.

http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2005/07/reincarnation_a.html

Also, remember the parents who caused a major rescue when they claimed that their son had been accidentally taken up in a weather balloon that wasn't properly secured. Their motivation was to get on some reality TV show (and make money from it). I wouldn't rule that out here too.

BTW, below is just one sceptics comment from the above link. There are many mundane interpretations that can be placed on things. However, it can be so easy to lead people as to "the only possible conclusion"

"In one video of James at age 3, he goes over a plane as if he's doing a preflight check."...

..."At some point the child starts drawing pictures of planes, signing them 'James 3'"

hmmm...so a 3 year old writes "3" after his name. Wow, it must mean he is reincarnated! What else could it possibly mean???

 

[bunyip]

Recently I was in a car in which one of the passengers was a woman who is a practicing Catholic, and she also frequently hangs out at the Buddhist establishment in her city.
We were approaching a storm that was about 20 km away – she closed her eyes and moved her lips and made the sign of the cross every time there was a lightning bolt.

Now, maybe I’m being a bit harsh or too hasty to judge, but her behavior seemed like religious nuttery to me.

 

[Chris45]

Here is one and it seems a lot more plausible than your reincarnation theory.
http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2005/07/reincarnation_a.html

Nice try!
Firstly, it's not MY reincarnation theory.
Secondly, skeptics can easily fabricate an alternative hypothesis but that doesn't disprove the original claim, so really it means nothing.

Skeptico quotes these omissions from the TV report as objections:

"At 18 months old, his father, Bruce Leininger, took James to the Kavanaugh Flight Museum in Dallas, Texas, where the toddler remained transfixed by World War II aircraft. A few months later, the nightmares began."

If the child had been reincarnated from a WWII fighter pilot who died traumatically as claimed, it's logical that he would be transfixed, and of course he would experience nightmares as the memories came back. Skeptic FAIL!

"With guidance from Bowman, they began to encourage James to share his memories ”” and immediately, Andrea says, the nightmares started to become less frequent. James was also becoming more articulate about his apparent past, she said."

As would be expected with counseling! I don't know why those details were omitted because they support the story! Poor editing perhaps? Skeptic FAIL!

"I’d like to suggest a slightly different version of this story that is entirely consistent with the facts, but doesn’t require us to believe the extraordinary claim of reincarnation."

So what follows is entirely his fabrication, unsupported by any evidence, to fit the known facts, ie. fiction based on fact. Proves nothing ... other than he's a poor fiction author. Skeptic FAIL!

He glosses over the "couple of inexplicable hits":
"But “Natoma” is not quite “Natoma Bay”" ... Abbreviation of ships' names is common in the services. Skeptic FAIL!
"First, James is not an unusual name." ... Neither is John, Chuck, etc. etc, but what's the probability of a correct guess? Skeptic FAIL!

I clicked on the http://www.ntcsites.com link and it's defunct and listed for sale. Skeptic FAIL! again

As an attempted alternative explanation, Skeptico's effort is pathetic and totally unconvincing. Obviously, reincarnation will be impossible to prove conclusively, and anyone who wants to dismiss it all as nonsense is free to do so. But review the evidence and then make up your own minds.

Also, remember the parents who caused a major rescue when they claimed that their son had been accidentally taken up in a weather balloon that wasn't properly secured. Their motivation was to get on some reality TV show (and make money from it). I wouldn't rule that out here too.

The incident about the weather balloon kid is irrelevant ... it was blatant fraud. Did the James kid's family tell their story for money? Where did it say that?


Bunyip, that guy who was struck by lightning on the beach yesterday obviously forgot to do something.

 

[bellenuit]

Sceptico was trying to look at alternative explanations to the reincarnation theory proposed. The museum visit would seem very relevant to the story and its omission is curious. A few people have discarded the relevance of the visit on the basis of what a 20 month old child would understand or recall. Yet, I distinctly remember being in a pram and some events surrounding it (where we crossed the road etc.). I wouldn't have been much older than that, if at all older. We need only look at some child prodigies to see what can be accomplished at a very young age, so it is not beyond possibility that certain aspects of the museum visit stuck in James' memory, even if the parents have no recollection of same.

You could say that the counsellor helped James understand what he was recalling, but she could equally be leading him in a direction that she wants the story to take. Her involvement too is very relevant and could explain a lot of what James subsequently recalled.

Yes, there are many aspects of the story that cannot be explained, but then do we have the full story? How do we know what the family is telling us is true? Why should a hoax be ruled out? Aren't 60 Minutes style stories (I know it wasn't that particular show) full of these type of stories that fail to give the full picture but are intended to make headlines.

Even if we accept everything as true, then it would appear that part of the memories of one individual were transmitted to another individual. Is that possible? That hasn't been ruled out by anyone, but putting names to this transmission, such as reincarnation, may be jumping the gun. Reincarnation as I understand it is the rebirth of the soul in another body. That is a big jump for what we know from this story.

This recent discovery suggests that phobias may be memories passed down from ancestors through genes.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/...ries-passed-down-in-genes-from-ancestors.html

Maybe something similar is possible in this case (I am not advocating that, but not ruling it out as an explanation since so little is known in that area). Many have commented on the similarity between James when he was young and the dead pilot when he was young. Maybe there is a genetic link between the two that people are unaware of. Most reincarnation stores that I have come across have never required that both be similar in appearance, so the fact that they are may be relevant.

Again reiterating what I said: Even if we accept everything as true, then it would appear that part of the memories of one individual were transmitted to another individual. But what conclusions do we draw from that? That there must be a God? That evolution is false? That there was or was not a Big Bang? Perhaps simply, that we don't fully understand memory?

 

[bellenuit]

Secondly, skeptics can easily fabricate an alternative hypothesis but that doesn't disprove the original claim, so really it means nothing.

I have no idea where you are leading to on this. Of course a sceptic looks at alternative hypotheses and if plausible they don't have to be proven. For instance, they cannot prove that all of this is a hoax as they would require the perpetrators to tell the truth which they may never do, but that it being a hoax is probably a better explanation than the reincarnation theory. How do you disprove that someone hasn't been abducted by aliens if they make that claim? However, past experience tells us what is the most likely explanation to be true.

The purpose of the sceptics approach is to seek out alternative explanations for you to consider. At the end of the day the sceptic may be wrong, but that doesn't mean they have failed in what they try to do. Their aim is to make you think and not blindly accept what others are trying to make you think.

I don't intend to go through each of your points, as I am really more interested in your Skeptic fail comments and want to use just one as an example.

"With guidance from Bowman, they began to encourage James to share his memories ”” and immediately, Andrea says, the nightmares started to become less frequent. James was also becoming more articulate about his apparent past, she said."

As would be expected with counseling! I don't know why those details were omitted because they support the story! Poor editing perhaps? Skeptic FAIL!

You misunderstand the purpose of scepticism.

Your explanation of what the results of the counsellor meeting did is quite valid. But by providing an alternative explanation, the Skeptic didn't fail. The Skeptic strives to make you think and consider other possibilities. That the counsellor was already a believer in reincarnation and had written a book on the subject could mean that she had an interest in promoting this reincarnation story and led James on a path that she wanted him to go in. The skeptic cannot prove that is the case, but it is a potential explanation to what happened following her involvement. It is a plausible explanation of this part of the story and if it makes one stop and think and not blindly follow just one possible explanation, that the sceptic had done his job. Not a fail.

 

[cynic]

Cynic - no, I had not failed to notice you are trying to draw a correlation between the remaining 23 ribs and the 23 chromosomes contributed by the male and the female, but I think you are drawing rather a long bow!! You are trying to manipulate data to fit neatly into your hypothesis.

Is the bow really that long?

Prior to offering my hypothesis, the numerical and symbolic correlations were already sufficiently strong to render them recognisable!

My medieval monk hypothesis was conveniently formulated to plausibly (and "neatly") demonstrate that one logical step is all that separates our, seemingly nonsensical, current day biblical account from a perfectly valid genetic statement of the creation of a woman from a man!

 

[cynic]

More than that, there is no 23 anywhere. Adam's contribution was 1 rib, not 23. If the monk was mistranslating, where is he getting this magical 23 from. Both man and woman have 24 ribs, 12 pairs of two. If the monk misunderstood rib when chromosome was meant, then it still does not explain why the Bible only mentions taking just 1 item of this chromosome to form a woman. Was that a mistranslation too?

Your mystical number is 1 and I am sure there are millions of genetically related examples of 1 of some item being contributed or passed on to subsequent generations that would be far more relevant than what you are alluding to.

All of the things that you're challenging here have already been addressed in my earlier posts!

 

[cynic]

Cynic, would you kindly give the Biblical reference behind your quote. I only know Genesis 2:21-23.
...

Chris, I believe that you already have all the information that is required in order to appreciate my assertions. (i.e.the current day biblical passage, a basic understanding of the 23 chromosomal pairs and an awareness that the modern English language didn't exist at the time the underlying account was originally expressed.)

P.S. Thanks for offering that alternative theory. At this point I still prefer mine, but, it was comforting to see some members of academia are still willing to openly and earnestly explore the possibility that there may be more factual support for the account. So much more refreshing than witnessing the vehement dismissal that it so often receives.

 

[cynic]

bellenuit,

I find your accounts of the purposes and benefits of skepticism largely agreeable, however, I would ask that you cast your skeptical eye over the following excerpt and see whether there might be a logical flaw present in this part of your acclaimed skeptic philosophy. (To further narrow it down for you I offer the following word clue: "Pioneer").

...How do you disprove that someone hasn't been abducted by aliens if they make that claim? However, past experience tells us what is the most likely explanation to be true.
...

 

[bunyip]

Recently I was in a car in which one of the passengers was a woman who is a practicing Catholic, and she also frequently hangs out at the Buddhist establishment in her city.
We were approaching a storm that was about 20 km away – she closed her eyes and moved her lips and made the sign of the cross every time there was a lightning bolt.

Now, maybe I’m being a bit harsh or too hasty to judge, but her behavior seemed like religious nuttery to me.

Bunyip, that guy who was struck by lightning on the beach yesterday obviously forgot to do something.

Yes – he forgot to use a bit of common sense by staying indoors out of harms way when it was storming. I don't think praying would have kept him safe if he was silly enough to go out in a storm.
I know a Christian family whose 20 year old son was killed by lightning.
It never ceases to amaze me that so many people are complacent about storms. Former Ironman champion Grant Kenny had to shelter under his paddle board a few weeks ago to avoid getting his head caved in by hail stones the size of oranges. What was the silly bugger thinking of to be paddling around on the ocean while a storm was brewing!

Getting back to the woman in the car crossing herself and saying a silent prayer at each lightning bolt – I guess she was imploring her god not to take her out by a lightning strike. No doubt she thinks it worked since she came through the storm unscathed. It probably hasn’t occurred to her that hundreds of thousands of other people who didn’t pray came through the storm unscathed as well.

 

[Judd]

....Getting back to the woman in the car crossing herself and saying a silent prayer at each lightning bolt – I guess she was imploring her god not to take her out by a lightning strike. No doubt she thinks it worked since she came through the storm unscathed. It probably hasn’t occurred to her that hundreds of thousands of other people who didn’t pray came through the storm unscathed as well.

Not only that but she obviously was unaware that the car acts as a Faraday Cage. Even if it was an imperfect Faraday Cage, ie the window was down - which is an odd thing to do in a storm, the car would more than likely protect you as it still acts as a Faraday cage and electrons will travel the path of least resistance which would be through the car and not you. Ergo, praying not required and ineffective in any case.

 

[bellenuit]

All of the things that you're challenging here have already been addressed in my earlier posts!

No you haven't. You continue to vacillate between 23 being the original components and 23 being the leftover components as in these two statements from above.....

"Through removal of an item from the 23 components of the man a woman was fashioned."

and

The next clue: 24 - 1 = 23

However, lets skip the math for a moment and consider the original basis of your argument.

Imagine a medieval monk translating an ancient language equivalent of my statement!
There he is wondering what is meant by the removal of an item from one of 23 components of a man. Bearing in mind that he has no knowledge of chromosomes, said monk erroneously concludes that the statement must be in reference to the human ribcage after removal of one of the ribs!

But people today know what chromosomes are and the translations of the Bible are constantly being retested by scholars. Wouldn't they have picked up on it by now if that was a mistranslation. And what a whopper it would be of a mistranslation. It is not just making the wrong choice between two possible interpretations of one word (for instance it is claimed that the word that was translated to "virgin" in relation to Mary also meant "young girl").

This is the text as we know it today:

"And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place. Then the rib which the Lord God had taken from man He made into a woman, and He brought her to the man. And Adam said: 'This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.'" (Genesis 2:18, 21-23, NKJV)

How on earth do you get a child receiving 23 chromosomes from each parent from that. What way could you reformulate that to convey what you are suggesting without pretty much discarding everything and writing something completely different. As I have said so many times, 23 does not come into it. 1 component was taken. That passage does not mention left over components anywhere.

 

[CanOz]

Court told two men committed random assault on Gold Coast after attending church camp

Seems they didn't catch the meaning of the church at the camp! Must be atheists

 

[bellenuit]

Rabbi Sued For Accidentally Severing Baby's Penis During Bris

http://gothamist.com/2013/12/29/rabbi_sued_for_accidentally_severin.php

Polio vaccination workers shot dead in Pakistan

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/dec/18/polio-vaccination-workers-shot-pakistan

 

[Chris45]

It never ceases to amaze me that so many people are complacent about storms. Former Ironman champion Grant Kenny had to shelter under his paddle board a few weeks ago to avoid getting his head caved in by hail stones the size of oranges. What was the silly bugger thinking of to be paddling around on the ocean while a storm was brewing!

Unbelievable! Also golfers who ignore the warning signs and insist on completing their games.

I saw a photo of the beach where the guy was killed. There were many other people also on the beach but the clouds didn't look too threatening. I suppose it shows how easy it is to be complacent.

Some years ago I went out onto my balcony to watch some distant lightning on the horizon. I was enjoying the spectacle from what I thought was a safe distance until a bolt struck a house less than a quarter of a km away. I nearly messed myself. You don't fully appreciate the awesome energy of lightning until you have a close encounter like that.

I wonder if your Catholic woman had had a similar or worse experience, or maybe had lost someone to lightning. Her prayers weren't hurting anyone and probably helped her cope with her perceived danger.

 

[Chris45]

We need only look at some child prodigies to see what can be accomplished at a very young age,

It's interesting that you mention child prodigies, as it has been suggested that they support the reincarnation theory.

Skeptico's alternative hypothesis credits the boy with an incredible imagination for a young child, that I didn't find at all convincing. I see your point about the "purpose of scepticism", but what troubles me is that many people will read his flawed explanation, will assume that the original hypothesis has been thoroughly discredited, and will close their minds and won't bother to explore further. I just don't believe that approach is helpful.

What we should do is consider ALL of the evidence presented, not only in this case but the other cases as well, with critical but open minds, looking for any flaws in the methodology and evidence, and then see where the evidence leads us. I believe that's what Stevenson and Tucker have been doing.

Our world is getting weirder and weirder. Try reading about Multiverse Theory: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiverse

"A multiverse of a somewhat different kind has been envisaged within string theory and its higher-dimensional extension, M-theory. These theories require the presence of 10 or 11 spacetime dimensions respectively. The extra 6 or 7 dimensions may either be compactified on a very small scale, or our universe may simply be localized on a dynamical (3+1)-dimensional object, a D-brane. This opens up the possibility that there are other branes which could support "other universes". This is unlike the universes in the "quantum multiverse", but both concepts can operate at the same time."

"10 or 11 spacetime dimensions" ... mind boggling!

Now they're saying that evidence for the Multiverse has been found: http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=5907

I also read, "According to a New Scientist story just out, this hard evidence for the multiverse should be welcomed, since it (together with string theory) has just been shown to have the power to save us from “Legions of disembodied brains floating in deep space”."

Sounds like they're referring to reincarnation. I'm not yet a 100% believer in reincarnation, but I find the evidence for the theory I've seen so far pretty compelling, but who knows? We are still on the lower rungs of the very tall ladder of knowledge. One day someone might be able to make sense of it all for us lesser mortals.