I was reading the beginning of the Old Testament the other day, and I found something I did not know before. It often talks about people living over 900 years and having children after living for a century! Now assuming that this is true, why do you think these early humans are able to live for almost 1000 years? Perhaps it explains it later on and I havent read that far? Just wanted to hear what peoples thoughts were, because I am at a loss on how to explain this. Sure I have a few wild ideas, but nothing I have thought through.
Posted by Phanto (Member # 5897) on :
Assuming it's true, there are several explanations that the primary commentators give:
a) The air was healthier back then b) People were closer to God back then c) People ate healthier back then (not as much meat) d) People used genetic alterations to eliminate all diseases, but most of the material was lost in the great flood. The few pieces that were recovered slowly broke down and could not be replaced.
[ June 18, 2004, 01:39 AM: Message edited by: Phanto ]
Posted by Lupus (Member # 6516) on :
One guy I know that was rather hard core about bible research mapped out the ages of people preflood and post flood. According to his charts age at death dropped off suddenly after the flood. His theory is preflood we had a thicker atmosphere (they water had to come from somewhere) which led to less UV rays, leading to less problems with DNA breakdown...and of course no cancer. Post flood the atmosphere with thinner leading to more UV problems, more cancer. Also over time there were more problems with incest (pre Moses it was not banned...but it was not important since got created people with perfect genetics, over time it became a problem (which why it was banned later). As our genetics got worse, our lives got shorter.
I am not as qualified as him to describe it as him...but those are the rough details.
Posted by A Rat Named Dog (Member # 699) on :
I know this kind of half-violates the "assume this is true" condition, but I suspect that what changed was actually the reckoning of time Posted by fallow (Member # 6268) on :
chutzpah!
they had it. we don't. ergo.
fallow
Posted by Phanto (Member # 5897) on :
What they had was respect. Kids these days ain't got none. If we all had respect, we'd all live to 751ans, and that's a fact.
Posted by ReikoDemosthenes (Member # 6218) on :
I can't say I'd want to live that long, but my dad told me he also knew a Bible scholar who said something about the Earth being covered in a thick mist of sorts before the flood, that water came down as rain and was gone after the flood...I'm not sure of the exact description either, but yeah...
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I thought it was because of the strain of elvish passed down from Elros.
Posted by Telperion the Silver (Member # 6074) on :
What my religion professors told me at college was that very very old age or large numbers used in the Bible in general are only symbolic. They are used to show holiness or punctuate that a person lived a long time, or in the cases of armies with ten million soldiers just to point out to the reader that the army was very large.
Ever read "Watership Down"? The rabbits can't count beyond the number 5 very well so anything over 5 they say is 1000. The 1000 is not accutate, but shows that the number is large.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Hrair.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
The two explanations I have heard -- that God created Adam & Eve perfectly (physically)in their time, and that we have weakened that perfection over several centuries, so our DNA is not as perfect, etc.
I have also heard that they measured time differently back then.
But I think if you keep reading, you will find a passage about after the flood, I think, where God decides to "limit their time" and actually shortens the life span of mankind. I will see if I can find it.
farmgirl
Posted by Telperion the Silver (Member # 6074) on :
Kinda reminds me of the Numenoreans and the shortening of their years with the thinning of their original blood.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Not a coincidence, I'm sure. Posted by Telperion the Silver (Member # 6074) on :
I'm sure. Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
quote: Genesis 6 3 And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.
I just found the verse on an on-line search -- let me go back to read context to make sure that's the right one...
FG
Posted by ak (Member # 90) on :
Well, there's no way to know for sure, but I have read that if you limit your caloric intake by about 1/3, and only eat 2/3 of the calories they recommend for a normal person, while still being careful to get complete nutrition, it can extend one's life greatly.
This holds true across the whole darn animal kingdom, from spiders and crawfish to octopi, fish, mammals, birds, reptiles, insects, everything. Cut caloric intake sharply while maintaining full nutrition and the lifespan goes way up.
This led me to think that perhaps if you were very in tune with God, that He could guide you thusly (and moreso) in exactly what to eat and how much, so that you would live a great deal longer still. So I guess that means I'm of the "closer to God" school of thought on this subject.
The idea that people didn't know how many years 900 was seems wrong to me, for sure. They weren't rabbits back then. They could count. Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
They could count, but the authors were not contemporaries of the people being discussed. Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Thank you, Dag.
*Hops off to silflay*
Posted by Jalapenoman (Member # 6575) on :
Questions on the idea of living to be 900 years old.
These are for thought and discussion (okay, some are a little facetious):
1. If you lived to be 900 years old, how long was childhood? Was the onset of puberty still about 12?
2. How long were the childbearing years? Did women still have kids up through their 400's or did this stop about 35 to 40?
3. When did the body start to break down and age? It is obvious that you could not live over 800 years if you looked like our modern 85 year old. Could a 350 year old woman look hot in her bikini on the beach?
4. How old did you get before you started complaining about "that darn noise" those kids listen to?
5. How did people afford nursing home care with so many relatives in there?
6. Was it robbing the cradle for a 600 year old to have eyes for a 300 year old (or would they have little in common to talk about)?
Posted by sarcasticmuppet (Member # 5035) on :
Sarah miraculously gave birth to Isaac when she was ninety, but that was post-flood. I guess Methusela's wife would have thought nothing of that. Posted by Promethius (Member # 2468) on :
I would like to think that a 350 year old would still look good in a bikini, or atleast could look good. I mean, thats what? 1/3 of the way through her life. 30 year olds can still look good in bikinis. So I am gonna have to give my very well researched and factually based answer of yes, a 350 year old could look darn tootin good.
Posted by Tammy (Member # 4119) on :
Creation 101 kids.
God created Adam and Eve. They were created in his image, perfect.
Methuselah and everyone else that lived to such an extremely healthy age were closer to perfection.
We're currently so far off from perfection it's scary...isn't it!
Posted by Sugar+Spice (Member # 5874) on :
But following that argument, people are living longer these days... so does that make us more perfect than people a hundred years ago?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
It's a story, folks. This is not meant to be taken literally.
Humans have existed for millions of years and for most of that time, the average lifespan was roughly 30 years.
Posted by ak (Member # 90) on :
"It's a story, folks." That's what they said about Troy. So, as it turns out, some stories are true. Posted by Phanto (Member # 5897) on :
Actually, Troy hasn't been proven as truth?
Posted by digging_holes (Member # 6237) on :
I don't buy all this "it's just symbolism" stuff. If those numbers were symbolic, they would all be nice, round numbers. Same thing if they couldn't really count ( ) Those ages in the old testament are very specific and varied. And I don't buy this story about reckoning time differently.
You know what? I have this crazy idea that it's actually all true.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Humans have existed for millions of years and for most of that time, the average lifespan was roughly 30 years.
I thought the commonly accepted time was about 100,000 years?
Dagonee
Posted by Promethius (Member # 2468) on :
Shame on you Bob Scopatz my first post was saying that we are to assume its true!!
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Assume for a moment that Bob is correct, and the average age at death at the time was indeed 30. Doesn't it make sense that the ones who were close to God (and/or the ones who the Bible chose to record) would be the extreme outliers of the statistical spread?
Posted by mackillian (Member # 586) on :
Pfft. Weirdos.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Oh, and since Noah didn't have his kids until age 500, and Lamech was 182 when his (first) son was born -- Methuselah 187, Enoch 65, Jared 162, Mahalel 65, Kenan 70, Enosh 90, and Seth 105 -- I would argue for an extended adolescence.
You thought having the kids living at home until they were 18 or 20 or 25 was bad! Imagine poor Methuelah's mom, "Dear, you're already 150! When are you going to move out, get married, and provide me with a grandchild? Do you think I'm going to live forever?"
Posted by mackillian (Member # 586) on :
*snort*
Posted by ReikoDemosthenes (Member # 6218) on :
quote: I don't buy all this "it's just symbolism" stuff. If those numbers were symbolic, they would all be nice, round numbers. Same thing if they couldn't really count. Those ages in the old testament are very specific and varied. And I don't buy this story about reckoning time differently.
You know what? I have this crazy idea that it's actually all true.
The only difference in time I would suspect would be a 360 day year, myself...
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
No, human species have been on the planet for millions of years, not a hundred thousand.
Neanderthal died out about 50,000 years ago.
Next to Homo Sapiens, they were the most technologically advanced and had the largest brains relative to body size. (if that matters).
But there have been human species on Earth for awhile. It's just a blip in geological time, but still...not 100,000 years.
Okay, now, what's easier to believe: 1) That oral history of the Semitic people includes some exageration and hyperbole just to make a point, or,
2) That the scriptural account is literally true and the evidence of human evolution is just a cosmic joke or scientists being sloppy in not accounting for things like: - the year having become lengthened by a factor of at least 5 within the past 12,000 years, or - humans suddenly going from a species with longevity measured in CENTURIES to a species that lives generally 50 or so years at best.
Really, folks, you all need to study some genetics and some geology and anthropology before taking these stories literally.
Has it ever occurred to anyone who does this sort of thing that you might be missing the real point of the story?
It occurs to me all the time. By forcing the Bible to be literally true, I think one robs it of much of it's real value as a moral and spiritual guide.
<that is all>
[ June 20, 2004, 11:06 AM: Message edited by: Bob_Scopatz ]
Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
Bob=voice of reason.
For a change!
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Bob, the Chimp/human lines diverged 5 million years ago. Homo sapiens aren't thought to exist until 200,000 to 100,000 years ago. When you say "Humans have existed for millions of years and for most of that time, the average lifespan was roughly 30 years" are you referring to the current human species or to ancestor and extinct lines from that divergence?
The terminology is vague enough that head-banging doesn't seem warranted. Since we were talking about people that were clearly of our species, I didn't imagine someone would introduce other species into the discussion.
quote:Really, folks, you all need to study some genetics and some geology and anthropology before taking these stories literally.
One, you're assuming people commenting on this haven't.
Two, most of the speculations here involve human beings becoming more part of nature and less connected to the divine. If that happened, wouldn't you expect anamolous results that don't match up with genetic analysis?
[ June 20, 2004, 11:48 AM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
One of the ways to discuss the likely attributes of a species is to discuss the attributes of its close relatives, particularly if more is known of those relatives.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
But in this case, less is known about those relatives because they're extinct.
Saying that genetics and anthropology show that the authors were exagerating is making exactly the same mistake that people who take the Bible literally make when trying to convince others of some "fact." "The Bible says it so it must be true" is not proof to those who don't already beleive the Bible is meant to be taken literally in all parts. "Science shows that X is unlikely" is not evidence against X to someone who believes X occurred because of a divine adjustment to normal natural law.
The ages were noted in the scripture because they were different than the norm - they're there because it was recognized as being outside the normal natural progression. Saying, "people don't live that long" doesn't disprove the scripture, because the reason the ages were mentioned is that the author knows people don't normally live that long.
Dagonee
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"I have this crazy idea that it's actually all true."
Yeah, it is pretty craxy. The ages of the ancients are, quite frankly, some of the most obvious and ridiculous lies in the Bible.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Obvious when you look in your crystal ball that lets you look back in time?
Ridiculous because you haven't seen anything like that before?
What on Earth is your basis for such a statement?
Dagonee
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
I think Bob was right in saying that people shouldn't interpret the Bible too literally.
Joseph Campbell seemed to have the same opinion.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I wonder how many in this thread have read Herodotus.
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
I wonder how many have read Sidartha. Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Also, to be nitpicky Dagonee, many of the ages were just mentioned as bits of genealogical records, with no particular emphasis on that suggests they were unique.
Posted by Phanto (Member # 5897) on :
Herodotus as in the Greek historian that wrote great praise about the Persian street system? What about him?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Herodotus as in the guy who wrote the first modern history.
To completely spoil the subtlety of my point:
Herodotus wrote a lot of ridiculous things down that turned out to be true.
Herodotus also wrote a lot of ridiculous things down that turned out to be false.
Posted by Jalapenoman (Member # 6575) on :
The Bible, including the book of Genesis, is a book that exists to teach us of God. It is not 100% verifiable. If it were, then there would be no need to develop faith.
There have been a lot of books written in the past 50 years on Noah's ark. Dozens of people have claimed to have seen the ark, walked on the ark, and taken pictures of the ark. No one, however, has been able to bring it down from the mountain or set it up as a tourist attraction.
Why not? If that happened, then most people would believe in the world wide flood story because of the physical proof that confronted them. They would not need to have faith, which is the basis of any and all modern religion.
So, I have a belief system that includes the Bible, and therefore the book of Genesis. If that book tells me that men lived to be 900 years old, I believe it to be true. If the same Bible tells me that a man was swallowed by and lived three days inside of a large fish, then I believe it to be true.
Within this life, we cannot prove faith based belief. In the next life, we will be able to understand the "why" of all these things. We will know what really happened with Noah and Jonah and the extended lifespans. We will also understand what really happened to the missing Roanoke colony and who killed Kennedy.
I am content to wait until then and work to build my faith into true belief in the meantime.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote: Two, most of the speculations here involve human beings becoming more part of nature and less connected to the divine. If that happened, wouldn't you expect anamolous results that don't match up with genetic analysis?
How in God's name would ANYONE know what to expect in such a case? I don't mind arguing speculative Science with people, I mean, after all, there's a hope that someday we could uncover archaeological evidence or figure out the genetics of closely related species (even extinct ones) and have some reasonable certainty.
But to say that: 1) We're less divine today 2) We're more involved with "nature" 3) That would have consequences 4) That those consequences would be ANOMALOUS and show up as something that DIDN'T match our genetics.
I mean, this line of reasoning doesn't even make sense in the fallacious and amateurish brand of logic that passes for theological thinking in the Evangelical churches.
It doesn't even rise to the level of speculation.
It's just muddle-headed nonsense.
Look, if God made everything, he made Genetics. So...what? Then he goes and violates this neat little thing he developed that explains ALL life on the planet, except the past 6,000 years or so when Humans were plunked down?
It's just hammering the Bible into your preconceived notions of what MUST be true because some authority told you it was.
And it only exists BECAUSE people insist on taking the Bible to be literally true.
And to what purpose? Are the stories more meaningful because you can fake up some back-story to explain how it was that the patriarchs lived a lot longer than we do?
And, of course, it has to involve some sort of moral decay on our part.
It's just a bunch of made up stories for no good purpose.
You're adding to the Bible for no good reason that I can see.
You want to believe it, I have no problem with that. But to insist that there's a logical explanation for it is just not going to work. At best, it's a mystery.
At worst, it's hyperbole used to make a better more engaging story.
Not a big deal.
Until someone insists on the veracity of it all and tries to invent wildly illogical mechanisms by which it might have come to pass.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"f that book tells me that men lived to be 900 years old, I believe it to be true. If the same Bible tells me that a man was swallowed by and lived three days inside of a large fish, then I believe it to be true."
That's a genuine shame. I imagine it would get very tiring to have to consistently ignore observed reality to conform to the demands of a four-thousand-year-old oral history.
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
Even if the bible is "the word of God", it was written down by limited and imperfect humans. With an imperfect understanding. Could it be that the humans who developed this story may have misconstrued the idea?
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Shockingly, I agree with Dagonee on this one.
And Bob, you're refusing to believe that to God, the "natural" and the "miraculous" are one. That is your right.
Don't belittle others because we do. You are right that there are some religious people who accept the Bible as literally true out of unquestioning ignorance. I am not one of them, and neither is Dagonee or Jalopenoman (from what I've seen of him). Stop being insulting.
Tom, I believe it is a shame that you have closed your eyes and heart to the signs of the divine all around you. *shrug* Every person chooses his own prison, neh?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Bob_Scopatz said:
How in God's name would ANYONE know what to expect in such a case?
Well, that’s kind of my point. How do you know what to expect? My point is, if something happened that was unusual, then we shouldn’t be surprised when unusual results occur.
quote:I don't mind arguing speculative Science with people, I mean, after all, there's a hope that someday we could uncover archaeological evidence or figure out the genetics of closely related species (even extinct ones) and have some reasonable certainty.
But to say that: 1) We're less divine today 2) We're more involved with "nature" 3) That would have consequences 4) That those consequences would be ANOMALOUS and show up as something that DIDN'T match our genetics.
I mean, this line of reasoning doesn't even make sense in the fallacious and amateurish brand of logic that passes for theological thinking in the Evangelical churches.
I didn’t say we were “more involved with nature.” I said that humans, as the only dual-natured beings in existence that we know about (spirit and physical in the Judeo-Christian tradition) lost some of the direct connection to the spiritual side, exposing us to the physical (which scientists have described as the “natural” aspect).
quote:It doesn't even rise to the level of speculation.
It's just muddle-headed nonsense.
Well, thank God you’re here to straighten us all out.
quote:Look, if God made everything, he made Genetics. So...what? Then he goes and violates this neat little thing he developed that explains ALL life on the planet, except the past 6,000 years or so when Humans were plunked down?
It's just hammering the Bible into your preconceived notions of what MUST be true because some authority told you it was.
Funny, I thought that’s what you were doing by insisting they were hyperbole – those ages must be false because of “genetics and anthropology.”
And you’re insistence that it would be a violation of genetics is ludicrous. First, we understand very little of the genetic limitations on lifespan. We’ve just recently discovered that at least some of the “junk” DNA probably conveys very meaningful information.
Secondly, and more important, you consider these lifespans to be a violation of some law which we can’t even begin to articulate. At least one person has lived to be 120 years old. I doubt that science can indefinitely extend human lifespan, namely because efficient evolution seems to suggest that multiple human systems will have roughly the same lifespan. But I’m not convinced it’s impossible. And if it is possible with science, might it be possible for someone with a source of knowledge better than any we have access to directly?
Imagine if someone knew exactly the healthiest way to eat (which we don’t know now), the right amount of exercise, avoided bad habits, and was never threatened by accident, predation, or sickness. 120 years might be extended by a lot. I don’t think such an extension would happen within the normal physical laws of nature. BUT, I think that’s the point of the story.
quote:And it only exists BECAUSE people insist on taking the Bible to be literally true.
And to what purpose? Are the stories more meaningful because you can fake up some back-story to explain how it was that the patriarchs lived a lot longer than we do?
No, because I believe this might be true and certainly do not believe the entire Bible to be literally true. But I do believe that God incarnated as a human being, voluntarily suffered crucifixion, and rose from the dead. That’s a lot harder to believe than some people living longer than we do now.
I believe this kind of speculation is EXACTLY why such stories are included in the Bible – to encourage people to think, and to try to reason out why something might be so.
quote:And, of course, it has to involve some sort of moral decay on our part.
Since most of Genesis is about moral decay, this shouldn’t surprise you.
quote:It's just a bunch of made up stories for no good purpose.
You're adding to the Bible for no good reason that I can see.
And you’re subtracting from it to no good purpose. We have no way of knowing if these people lived that long. We have some texts that say they did. We have NOTHING telling us they didn’t except our rather mediocre understanding of life.
quote:You want to believe it, I have no problem with that. But to insist that there's a logical explanation for it is just not going to work. At best, it's a mystery.
At worst, it's hyperbole used to make a better more engaging story.
You’re the one insisting that something is true, not me.
quote:Not a big deal.
You seem to think it is.
quote:Until someone insists on the veracity of it all and tries to invent wildly illogical mechanisms by which it might have come to pass.
Again, you’re the one insisting it’s false. And you haven’t even begun to show why it’s “wildly illogical.”
Look, there’s no part of my faith that’s bound up in these ages being accurate. But a very large part of my faith is bound up in the idea that these ages could be accurate, and that they convey some aspect of truth that God thinks we should contemplate at some point.
quote:rivka said: Shockingly, I agree with Dagonee on this one.
Why shockingly?
Dagonee
Edit:
quote:TomDavidson said: That's a genuine shame. I imagine it would get very tiring to have to consistently ignore observed reality to conform to the demands of a four-thousand-year-old oral history.
You haven’t observed enough reality to know that’s impossible.
[ June 20, 2004, 02:32 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
*checks Dagonee's sarcasm meter*
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Sorry. I had one of the batteries in backwards.
Dagonee
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Oh! Maybe that's what was wrong with mine last week.
And the week before that . . .
Posted by Promethius (Member # 2468) on :
I can totally see why it makes sense to take the bible literally. Why would you believe in the bible at all if you believed some of the things said in it are false? I guess what I am trying to say is, where do you draw the line at what you are supposed to believe and what is just nonsense? If you do that, then you are making the Bible extremely subjective to human interpretation, and then really what good is that? You can just say at any time that such and such isnt true whenever it fits your lifestyle or situation. I know that the Bible must be open to interpretation somewhat but taking it literally makes sense to me, I can see why people would.
Tom or Bob, I think one or both of you said it was an oral history passed down. But, it is a common belief that moses actually wrote the first four books of the old testament. I wonder how much error was written by a man who supposedly spoke with God?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:I can totally see why it makes sense to take the bible literally. Why would you believe in the bible at all if you believed some of the things said in it are false?
Because there's a huge difference between false and not literally true.
Dagonee
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
I take the Bible much too seriously to take it literally.
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
quote: Tom, I believe it is a shame that you have closed your eyes and heart to the signs of the divine all around you. *shrug* Every person chooses his own prison, neh?
Tom never said that he had. You just assume that you cannot find the divine in what is offered in observed reality, or so it seems from your post.
Couldn't observed reality be a message from the divine? Isn't the divine all around us?
Posted by Promethius (Member # 2468) on :
Bahhhhh, I didnt realize there was a second page.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Great way to put that, dkw.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Yes, he has said so -- or implied it -- in many many posts. IMO, of course.
And yes, I see the divine in observed reality. It's the main reason I am a science teacher, and think science is so cool.
But to see the divine all around, one must first acknowledge its existence.
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
So how would a story of miracles, which has questionable, at best, credit, prove the divine better than direct observation.
Really, I don't get it. Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
It's not that it proves the divine. It's that it's a reflection of one aspect of the divine. I think the objection is to the assumption that mankind is capable of obeserving enough of the universe to understand how it works in every situation. It's hubris on an enormous level.
Dagonee
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
I never said it proved anything. In fact, I think a big part of the issue here is the different perspectives each of us are coming from.
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
You may have a point there.
But all I know is what I can observe. I can't really trust that either.
Reality is so confusing.... Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"You haven’t observed enough reality to know that’s impossible."
And in a tiny, secluded valley in darkest Africa, unicorns and yetis frolic with 900-year-old men and reporters from the Enquirer. You've never SEEN Bat-Boy, so you can't say he doesn't exist.
[ June 20, 2004, 04:17 PM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
You're right, I can't say he doesn't exist. I just live my life as if he doesn't until some greater proof comes along and reserve judgment.
On one side, we have written accounts which some people say are absolutely accurate, some people say could be accurate but are nonetheless providing some kind of enlightenment about God's plan for us, some people think might be true, and some people know as a ridiculous and obvious lie.
Tell me again how you have proof of your position?
Dagonee
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
rivka and Dagonee,
Please read my post again.
I am purposefully insulting only one group of people. Those who believe they should make up "just so" stories to explain whatever mysteries there are in the Bible.
If something is miraculous to you, then fine. Believe it, I'm fine with that too.
But when people try to make up a story to EXPLAIN it using quasi-scientific mumbo-jumbo -- usually getting the science part of it horribly and stupidly wrong, then I think I should at least try to disabuse them of their stupidity, lest they lead others down the same path.
It's crummy science and crummy theology. It has no place I can discern in religion or logic.
It's just idle speculation that, if anything, takes away from scripture and adds nothing of value that I can discern?
What? The air was thicker and humans were somehow "better" in those early days? What is that?
First off, we can easily prove the air WASN'T appreciably thicker, or more oxygenated, or what have you. Look at the studies of bubbles trapped in polar ice. Plus, there were birds, right? Things that fly in our current atmosphere would have a hard time in a thick atmosphere.
Besides, the adaptations required to go from thick to thin air would be pretty impressive. Chances are we'd have evidence of a mass extinction at about the right time frame. And I do mean a MAJOR one.
Oh wait, God made a miracle right?
Well, fine, then we're back to my saying "look, just take it on faith, call it a miracle and leave the rest of us out of your little bending and hammering on Scripture."
What is the point of this exercise?
At least if you want to have scientific curiosity, study the science that illuminates God in a far better way than these silly made up explanations that have no basis in anything and are usually untestable (and thus not at all scientific).
I am not trying to insult ANYONE's faith. But if this jumbled up illogical nonsense explanations are a cornerstone of your faith, then you have blatantly left off from Scripture and started just making junk up on your own.
And so, that offends MY faith, and MY rational thought, AND all the long history of human progress in science too.
Again, for no good reason, because you end up saying "it's a miracle" anyway.
Posted by digging_holes (Member # 6237) on :
quote: For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
-- Romans 1:20 (NIV)
quote: For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.
1 Corinthians 1:25 (NIV)
And that's all I have to say about that.
Posted by Suneun (Member # 3247) on :
I don't know much about the bible. But here's my biological reasoning on aging.
- The average human being right now, can't live to 200, or 300, or 900 years old. It's simply impossible. Telomeres, which are the end pieces of chromosomes, are the cause of finite cell division. While telomerase exists in nature to elongate telomeres, normal human cells still exhibit finite cell division. - It's feasible that there are people out there with an elongated set of telomeres that can live longer than ~120 years. But they're more likely than not to die for some other reason, due to malnutrition, cigarette smoking, obesity, or cancer. - It's possible that cancer was less of a risk in the past when correlated to age because many cancer risks are products of a modern age: less ozone, more burned meats, cigarettes, obesity...
I don't know how many people lived to be X-hundred years old in the bible. If there were only a few, it's vaaaaguely conceivable that they had a way around telomere-shortening. But with such a huge genetic advantage, they should have multiplied and become increasingly more common in the population. If this were a recessive trait, we would have been able to do a pedigree on the bible pedigrees to show this. And considering there are people who believe humans have only been on the Earth for ~6000 years, we should have heard of these people at other points in history. If the entire human population at that time could live for hundreds of years, it's even more likely that that 'genetic predisposition' would have remained. But as I said before, it's genetically impossible to live that long, no matter what foods you eat and how much sunscreen you put on.
So it seems you either have to 1) make unfounded claims as to how telomeres/genetics/inheritance played a part,
or, 2) wave your hands and do a deus ex machina. Which is what it sounds that Bob would rather you do.
edit: And I really really doubt that telomerase activity would have been helpful in producing longer-lived humans. Too much telomerase activity is pretty closely tied to cancer. You'd have to be able to prove (like with an experiment) that more widespread telomerase activity wouldn't be deadly.
[ June 20, 2004, 09:03 PM: Message edited by: Suneun ]
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"And that's all I have to say about that."
It's a shame you just quoted from a book without saying anything, then.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Actually, there's a book left out of Scripture right before Genesis. It recounts the trip from the homeworld and how the ship crash landed and the only survivors were left with some working devices (including a fully functional sickbay). But the devices gradually broke down and ran out of power until, basically, the people and their offspring lost all knowledge of the previous advanced technology that had kept them going so long.
That and breeding with the locals...
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Hey, Bob. Next post is 15,000 under that nick. Congrats.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote: rivka and Dagonee,
Please read my post again.
I am purposefully insulting only one group of people. Those who believe they should make up "just so" stories to explain whatever mysteries there are in the Bible.
If something is miraculous to you, then fine. Believe it, I'm fine with that too.
But when people try to make up a story to EXPLAIN it using quasi-scientific mumbo-jumbo -- usually getting the science part of it horribly and stupidly wrong, then I think I should at least try to disabuse them of their stupidity, lest they lead others down the same path.
Explain where I had any science in my posts that was wrong, or even where any of my posts depended on science.
quote:It's crummy science and crummy theology. It has no place I can discern in religion or logic.
Well, if you can’t discern it, I guess it’s worthless.
quote:It's just idle speculation that, if anything, takes away from scripture and adds nothing of value that I can discern?
What? The air was thicker and humans were somehow "better" in those early days? What is that?
First off, we can easily prove the air WASN'T appreciably thicker, or more oxygenated, or what have you. Look at the studies of bubbles trapped in polar ice. Plus, there were birds, right? Things that fly in our current atmosphere would have a hard time in a thick atmosphere.
Besides, the adaptations required to go from thick to thin air would be pretty impressive. Chances are we'd have evidence of a mass extinction at about the right time frame. And I do mean a MAJOR one.
Maybe you need to be clearer in your posts as to whom your ridiculing. The major rant of yours that got me involved with this thread started with a direct response to my post, and then threw some pretty insulting remarks out there. If they weren’t directed at me, your post is not at all clear on that point. If they were, and this is a follow-up, then I have to ask exactly what have I posted that this is remotely relevant to?
quote:Oh wait, God made a miracle right?
Well, fine, then we're back to my saying "look, just take it on faith, call it a miracle and leave the rest of us out of your little bending and hammering on Scripture."
What is the point of this exercise?
Curiosity? Because it’s fun? I think the real questions are why does this upset you so much, and why do you feel the need to make broad sweeping generalizations about people’s education who feel like speculating?
quote:At least if you want to have scientific curiosity, study the science that illuminates God in a far better way than these silly made up explanations that have no basis in anything and are usually untestable (and thus not at all scientific).
None of it’s testable. Whatever happened happened over 5,000 years ago.
quote:I am not trying to insult ANYONE's faith. But if this jumbled up illogical nonsense explanations are a cornerstone of your faith, then you have blatantly left off from Scripture and started just making junk up on your own.
Did you read my posts at all? A, this isn’t a cornerstone. It’s a relatively small part of scripture with no direct bearing on the central tenets of my faith, except that it’s found in what I believe to be divinely inspired scripture. B, I haven’t made anything up, nor has anyone offered their speculations as the truth. They’ve offered them as possibilities.
quote:And so, that offends MY faith, and MY rational thought, AND all the long history of human progress in science too.
The long history of human progress in science has nothing to do with this, except for the insane speculation that newly discovered scientific facts have somehow made it less likely that people lived a very long time a long time ago. Do you think people just now noticed that those guys’ recorded lifespans are a bit longer than ours? Your faith in the human progress of science must be pretty shaky if Sunday afternoon metaphysical discussions can threaten it. You’ve made appeals to anthropology and genetics, but haven’t applied them to anything except the thick air theory.
quote:Again, for no good reason, because you end up saying "it's a miracle" anyway.
The means of a miracle is as much up for speculation as the existence of the miracle. If you don’t like speculation on it, don’t speculate.
Dagonee
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"Well, if you can’t discern it, I guess it’s worthless."
I'll go even farther: if you can't discern it under any conditions, for any reasons, it doesn't matter at all whether it exists or not, and may as well be assumed to not exist.
There MIGHT be an invisible spirit floating through my house creating gumdrops that only he can eat, and only he can see, but I'm just going to have to go out on a limb here and say that he doesn't exist.
Heck, we're talking about something that can't even be discerned by its effect on the things around it; it's not like Pluto, where we can figure out that it has to exist by the orbit of other planets. In this case, you're asking people to believe that there's an invisible planet out there despite the fact that none of the other planets have odd orbits. It's not just that we can't see it; it's that what we CAN see makes it even less likely. We're talking about an invisible planet surrounded by a weird gravity field, in other words.
So, yeah, this planet could exist. But if you walk into an astronomy lab and say that a giant invisible man told you to look for his invisible, massless planet, they'd probably call you a kook.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Hey Tom, reread my post. The "thing" being discerned is the place of these speculations in science and logic. Not any physical phenomenon. If you're going to scan posts and cherry-pick comments you think are easy targets, take an extra minute to establish context first.
Dagonee
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote:I am purposefully insulting only one group of people. Those who believe they should make up "just so" stories to explain whatever mysteries there are in the Bible.
me
I admit I was insulting. If you fit the above category, I was insulting you. If not, then I wasn't.
You decide. I've lost track.
Posted by Promethius (Member # 2468) on :
The whole purpose of this thread was to speculate about why those people lived so long. It was not meant to be 100 percent factual in any way. Nobody was supposed to get offended about anything. And people were definitely not supposed to jump in and say X theory is wrong or X theory is right. Fun speculation thats all I wanted. I didnt really think anyone would have a true scientific reason that could be backed up, just something interesting that they had heard or even thought of.
And I also wondered if it ever addressed longevity elsewhere in the Bible. And Farmgirl so kindly posted the answer to that question.
Edit: Thought is spelled with a T, who knew?
[ June 20, 2004, 11:48 PM: Message edited by: Promethius ]
Posted by The Silverblue Sun (Member # 1630) on :
quote:...an extended adolescence.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Promethius,
I'm sorry I abused your thread. It is fun to speculate on such things.
I'm leaning toward the aliens as my favorite explanation for longevity of the patriarchs.
Although, I could probably construct a theory based on: 1) Earth's years lengthening. 2) A new species being relatively immune to diseases until such time as it became numerous enough to become a ready target for pathogens 3) The patriarchs being genetic mutants whose longevity genes were ultimately selected AGAINST because they just weren't very prolific. And through mixing with dominant genes that doom us to a shorter lifespan, their genetic contribution was lost. 4) Stem cell research.
rivka, Dagonee and others:
I owe you an apology for my snotty comments. I should have been more precise and less inciteful (as opposed to "insightful") in my previous posts.
My accusing tone was unwarranted and I certainly shouldn't have been so deliberately insulting.
I have no excuse. But I do offer the following explanation:
I really do think that Scriptural literalism is incorrect. But I don't really want to get into more of an argument over it. it's one of those issus that really sets me off because I feel like I understand the situations well, but when I try to communicate what I think is a better approach, it never really comes out right.
Again, not an exuse. And I'm sorry I was so unclear and so nasty about it.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
here is my own thread about dealing with frustrating scriptural literalists. It is on GreNME due to some slight profanity.
I've studied anthropology, evolutionary biology, modern physics, cosmology, and geology. I'm not a biblical literalist. Yet I feel that God knows a lot more about this universe than we do. Bob, did you not read what I said about the huge lengthening of life by the simple expedient of lowering caloric intake? This is stuff right out of Scientific American. Why could not someone with divine intelligence communicate to someone how and what exactly to eat and do in order to increase that by another factor of 5 or so? To me that's totally within the realm of reasonable possibility. There's no need to get insulting at all. I expect I know more about many of those subjects than do you.
I don't know whom you were intending to insult but it certainly felt like you meant me when I read your post. And that seems odd, and not like you. But I agree with what rivka said. The difference is in what one believes about God's intelligence and communications and the purpose and meaning of the miraculous.
(edit to accept apology with thanks )
[ June 21, 2004, 03:16 AM: Message edited by: ak ]
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
ak,
God has given nutrition advice to his people over the years.
1) Don't eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
2) The Mosaic laws.
Mostly, it seems, however, God has chosen to visit people with famines. I suppose that lowers their caloric intake as you suggest.
It doesn't seem to lengthen their lives any.
Maybe if they took vitamins too?
Anyway, I suppose if the price for a greatly elongated life was God choosing exactly what I should eat and when, I'd probably want to die.
<booming voice>
Have a banana, NOW!
<me> I was sort of hoping for a bite of leftover lamb.
<booming voice> NO!
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Maybe the patriarchs lied.
"Daddy, how old are you?"
"I'm 568 years old."
"Wow!"
"That's nothing, my grandfather lived to be 900!"
"900? Are you sure?"
<twap> "Are you calling me a liar, boy?"
Or, it could be they really felt that old, their lives being sort of boring and miserable. At least I would think that time hangs heavy on shepherds in the desert. After all that time in the sun, I bet they looked like they'd lived to be 900.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
ak, but seriously, one could just compare the dietary rules listed in the Mosaic laws to what your nutrition scientists have claimed would result in greatly elongated lifespan to see if there's any correlation.
Because that stuff is fairly prescriptive, no? If God gave his chosen people a set of dietary laws, one would have to assume that they were perfect, right? So, if those are the perfect rules for eating, then they should result in the longest life possible for modern humans.
Unless of course God gave advice based on some other criterion and actually shortened the lives of his chosen people. Not really likely, is it?
So, why not just look there and see.
Seems like your theory is at least somewhat testable against both science and scripture.
Posted by Mabus (Member # 6320) on :
You sure, Bob?
"I also gave them over to statutes that were not good and laws they could not live by." Ezekiel 20:25 Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Bob,
Thanks for the apologizing. In the purely speculating mood, a person with a direct connection to God could get personalized dietary advice, while the kosher laws that came later had to be generalized to a whole population.
On a more serious note, my belief on this is that a closer connection to God is the reason for any longevity increase; physical explanations are mere speculation as to how that connection worked.
The thing that confused me about the whole conversation is that many of the people arguing for longevity are known to not be biblical literalists, although all of them take some parts of the Bible very literally.
Dagonee
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"The 'thing' being discerned is the place of these speculations in science and logic."
Nope. The claim that is being made is that a handful of people lived in excess -- often great excess -- of 500 years. No proof, besides the claim of one oral history, is presented. No sound mechanism is suggested.
In response, I say that it's flatly impossible.
Your response, of course, is that it COULD be possible, based on our limited knowledge of everything that's ever gone on in the entire universe.
To which MY response is that, yes, invisible planets that have no mass at all, thus violating several known "rules" of physics, COULD exist -- but it's silly to say so.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Tom, you're looking sillier and sillier here.
Bob said the following:
quote:But when people try to make up a story to EXPLAIN it using quasi-scientific mumbo-jumbo -- usually getting the science part of it horribly and stupidly wrong, then I think I should at least try to disabuse them of their stupidity, lest they lead others down the same path.
It's crummy science and crummy theology. It has no place I can discern in religion or logic.
The thing to be discerned was the place of the "crummy science and crummy theology" in "religion or logic."
You're argument might be valid about some other part of this discussion, but not the quote it was in direct response to.
Technically, no one can discern the appropriateness of any philosophical statement in science or logic, at least by the standards you supplied.
You're response was flat out wrong when you made it, and your defense of it isn't any more correct now.
Dagonee
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Dag, when you wrote your response, you were CLEARLY being sarcastic; you were, in fact, suggesting that not all things which cannot be discerned by Bob are worthless.
I disagreed, specifically within the context of the larger conversation.
If you wish to argue whether or not things that cannot be discerned have value, that's one thing; if you wish to argue that Bob is simply not talented enough to discern these things, but that they CAN be discerned by someone with the ability, that's another.
I assumed the first, because the second is frankly insulting. If you're saying that you meant the second, I'll gladly go back and address the comment from that perspective.
[ June 21, 2004, 09:28 AM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by cyruseh (Member # 1120) on :
i have heard that it is not the environment that alters our ability to live long lives. Some will say, that after the flood, the environment was way different than prior. But if this was the case, Noah, who was 500 or so years old, would have died shortly after the flood but instead lived to over 900 years old.
Here is an article that explains how genetics plays a very big role in how long we will live. I know some of you will dismiss it right away, but at least read it to see what they have to say:long age Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Out of interest, do those of you who believe in the Biblical ancients ALSO believe in Chinese claims of mystics who have routinely lived 1000 years or more, often said to be due to diet, chi, and genetics?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:If you wish to argue whether or not things that cannot be discerned have value, that's one thing; if you wish to argue that Bob is simply not talented enough to discern these things, but that they CAN be discerned by someone with the ability, that's another.
I assumed the first, because the second is frankly insulting. If you're saying that you meant the second, I'll gladly go back and address the comment from that perspective.
My response was to the assertion by Bob that the only areas of worthwhile speculation were in areas where he discerned the value. I don't wish to belabor the point with Bob, because he's since apologized and we've moved on.
Look, the use of the word discern clearly did not mean with the use of the 5 senses (augmented or not), or inferences based on those 5 senses. Which means your response was non-sensical, since it is based only on physical discernment. The discussion Bob and I were having was akin to whether opera has any value, with one person saying he can't discern any and the other saying that one person's non-discernment of the value of opera doesn't make it non-valuable.
The refutation you posted was about an entirely different topic.
Dagonee
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
But it's a much more INTERESTING topic, I thought, than whether or not Bob's opinion matters to everyone. And as my take on it was directly relevant to the discussion you and I were having about experience being necessary for verification, I found it a useful digression. Don't you agree?
[ June 21, 2004, 10:51 AM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Since we're never going to agree whether discernment through means other than the 5 physical senses can produce useful knowledge, I'm not sure how useful it is. In this case, the evidence on one side is oral history. I believe it's the inspired word of God. You don't. On the other side is basically a set of norms that we've observed through the scientific method. I'm a firm believer in the scientific method. I just don't believe it's the only way to confirm truth.
By confirm truth, I mean to decide something is likely enough so as to act as if it's true. I have a high enough confidence (faith, if you will) that the Bible is the indpired word of God that I make many important life decisions based on it. As to whether people literally lived 1000 years, I don't need to decide that, since I don't plan to model my life on Methuseleh in order to live that long. BUT, I do believe those stories are there for a reason, that in some essential way they are true, and that speculating on the how and why is a useful exercise.
Dagonee Edit: In other words, as interesting as it might be, it's not a refutation of any point I made in the thread or any point I'm likely to make.
[ June 21, 2004, 10:58 AM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by ak (Member # 90) on :
I want to say something that this thread makes me think about. Here at hatrack we're able to discuss religious things with great respect for all views. I think that's the only way to discuss things like that. AJ's friend's comments made me think about this. And then this morning as I was reading in "The Brothers Karamazov" Dmitri's impassioned description of the human condition, I was struck again with how wise and brilliant was Dostoyevsky, who was first an atheist and then later a devout believer.
Back when I was an atheist, my dad once started to jump down my throat about it, and my mom interrupted him and said, "plenty of people a whole lot smarter than you have believed that through the years". And she meant it was true for all sides. Whenever anyone is tempted to have contempt or disdain for a different religious viewpoint than their own, they can with a few minute's research turn up people who believed that, who were far more intelligent, deeper thinkers, greater artists, with more understanding of life, the world and the human soul than they.
Any follower of Christ, in any case, ought never to have disdain or contempt for others, or be quick to ascribe to them bad or unworthy motives.
Yet we tend to do that (all of us, I think) again and again. We have this tendency to slip back into thinking we are right and everybody else is wrong and that's the end of the question.
Ceasing to question, failing to seek and try to learn more, in itself, seems to me to be an unwise course. Closing our minds to outside thoughts. At the very least, gaining a more appreciative understanding of another viewpoint is always worthwhile.
That's why I think hatrack is great, and why I'm grateful for hatrack. It's one of the very few places in which religious differences can be discussed with this sort of respect.
[ June 22, 2004, 10:59 AM: Message edited by: ak ]
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote:Any follower of Christ, in any case, ought never to have disdain or contempt for others, or be quick to ascribe to them bad or unworthy motives.
Yet we tend to do that (all of us, I think) again and again. We have this tendency to slip back into thinking we are right and everybody else is wrong and that's the end of the question.
Ceasing to question, failing to seek and try to learn more, in itself, seems to me to be an unwise course. Closing our minds to outside thoughts. At the very least, gaining a more appreciative understanding of another viewpoint is always worthwhile.
This is great! It is also true for everyone, not just Christians. Wonderful post!
Thanks!
Back to the topic at hand, I think, Dag, that you have been doing a bit of deliberate misconstruing. If your biggest problem with what I said was about my use of the word discernment, then I do think you missed my point.
My point was, really, that these made up explanations don't add anything of value to scripture. I personally find this kind of thing offensive, but I've already apologized for taking offense and I'm not going to go down that road again. I'll just state calmly (I hope) that the problem with all of these attempts is that they ignore the real beauty of the scripture in order to "figure it out."
I'm not averse to speculation, however. As ak so rightly pointed out, we should never close our minds to alternative ways of thinking about a topic.
And it is rather fun to try to come up with plausible explanations for something weird like this.
I just wish to add that one of the alternatives that should be considered is that the stories are not to be taken literally and that the use of the bizarre longevity figures is actually an explicit invitation by the authors to look for a deeper and more spiritual meaning. It's like a fantasy story, you suspend disbelief to get at the deeper truth. Same thing here. We don't have to pick it apart to make it make sense given our imperfect knowledge of the universe, science and theology.
We can just accept it and look for the deeper meaning.
Anyway, let's call that one way to look at it and not argue about whether I'm personally right or wrong.
Special to Mabus -- interesting selection. I wasn't going to go there because it perhaps implies some very troubling things about God's love. If the Mosaic laws are not for the good of the people God gave them to, well...let's just say I choose not to believe that God is perverse and COMPLETELY inscrutable from a human frame of reference.
I'm sure there's a lot of commentary in the Jewish tradition that might enlighten us on this topic. Rivka? Anyone?
Posted by Bob the Lawyer (Member # 3278) on :
Hey, ak, go back and read sun's post in this thread. It's a pretty solid argument against people having that life span.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Back to the topic at hand, I think, Dag, that you have been doing a bit of deliberate misconstruing. If your biggest problem with what I said was about my use of the word discernment, then I do think you missed my point.
I never said anything about your use of the word discernment being my biggest problems with your post. The only reason it got any more play than the one sentence I spent on it was because Tom took that one sentence totally out of context. Had I paid more attention to that point, Tom probably wouldn't have done so.
quote:My point was, really, that these made up explanations don't add anything of value to scripture. I personally find this kind of thing offensive, but I've already apologized for taking offense and I'm not going to go down that road again. I'll just state calmly (I hope) that the problem with all of these attempts is that they ignore the real beauty of the scripture in order to "figure it out."
See, here's what I totally don't understand. Examining possible mechanisms for the extended ages and seeing how they interact with various moral teachings of the surrounding text seems like a very good framework for examining scripture for deeper truths. One of those deeper truths is that the Fall affected every single aspect of human existence.
I guess the problem is that you saw the attempts to "figure it out" as the extent of the analysis. There's no reason discussing one aspect of scripture mandates ignoring other aspects.
quote:I just wish to add that one of the alternatives that should be considered is that the stories are not to be taken literally and that the use of the bizarre longevity figures is actually an explicit invitation by the authors to look for a deeper and more spiritual meaning. It's like a fantasy story, you suspend disbelief to get at the deeper truth. Same thing here. We don't have to pick it apart to make it make sense given our imperfect knowledge of the universe, science and theology.
We can just accept it and look for the deeper meaning.
I agree this is one possibility; nor does this possibility contradict any of my beliefs. But we spend pages speculating about the motivations of entirely made up characters on this board or exactly how an enigmatic woodsmen is immune to an evil ring. I think you miss an entire dimension when you limit your speculation to the moral and not to the untold portions of the tale.
quote:Anyway, let's call that one way to look at it and not argue about whether I'm personally right or wrong.
This is exactly what I wanted throughout this discussion, for everyone's way of looking at it.
Dagonee Edit: I just had to add this:
quote:Hey, ak, go back and read sun's post in this thread. It's a pretty solid argument against people having that life span.
No, it's a pretty solid argument against people having that life span without divine intervention of some kind.
[ June 22, 2004, 12:37 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by ak (Member # 90) on :
I'm supposing an intelligence with knowledge that far exceeds ours being in the equation, which definitely changes things. I'm not putting forth any hypothesis about how it was done, only giving the example of a counterintuitive lengthening of lifespan that we DO know how to achieve (though I don't think anyone understands yet how it works in terms of telomeres, etc.). I think I'm starting from the premise that there's a whole lot more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in our current philosophies.
And the Troy example shows that oral histories are often more accurate than people have given them credit for being.
That's why I consider it to be a reasonable possibility. However I won't argue with anyone who says we don't know at this point how to duplicate those results.
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
quote:Out of interest, do those of you who believe in the Biblical ancients ALSO believe in Chinese claims of mystics who have routinely lived 1000 years or more, often said to be due to diet, chi, and genetics?
Sure, why not? Maybe they were talking about the same ancestors.
Sun explained telomeres, not that they couldn't figure into a vastly longer lifespan.
I find it interested that most of our medical research is conducted on animals with much much shorter lifespans than us. A mouse or rat can only last 4 years, top IIRC. Of course this contracted lifespan is why they are good for research, but it also means that not everything we learn from them is applicable. Their immune systems are nowhere near as complex as ours.
So I've just always kind of thought, if seven dog years fit into one of ours, is it impossible that seven of our years could fit into another vertebrate's? If we are physiologically analogous to a mouse that lives 1/20th of our lifespan, is it impossible that something physically analogous to us could last 20 times as long?
Posted by Alai's Echo (Member # 3219) on :
quote:And the Troy example shows that oral histories are often more accurate than people have given them credit for being.
You mean like gods making men invincible? Most myths are based on some sort of somewhat actual occurance. If not, people have nothing to base things from.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I saw a special on Discovery or animal planet that, for mammals, lifespan has a fairly regular relationship to pulse rate. They put up a chart of a bunch of animals on the screen that showed mice, rabbits, dogs, deer, and elephants all living roughly the same number of heartbeats.
Dagonee
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
Another thought... suppose that via natural selection populations that matured sexually sooner had a survival advantage as they could outbreed the groups where an individual had to survive to 300 before reproducing. Since I believe variation and natural selection are facts, even if no one has explained chomosome jumping for me yet. (That is, how we get from a common ancestor to humans with x+1 chromosome and chimps with x-1 chromosome)
I hope we are all agreed that gains in lifespan since the middle ages have been due to advances in hygeinic technology and medicine.
The age of sexual maturation continues to go down, though consensus on why they would be is far from established.
P.S. I already explained how it happens on a population wide level. But it now seems to be happening from environmental reasons. I have heard theories on bovine growth hormones in milk, flouride, and the estrogenic compounds in plastics.
[ June 22, 2004, 01:04 PM: Message edited by: pooka ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I think she means like, the city really existed and there really was a war fought there.
Posted by Bob the Lawyer (Member # 3278) on :
Sure, Dags. Once you toss in the devine all bets are off.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote: Special to Mabus -- interesting selection. I wasn't going to go there because it perhaps implies some very troubling things about God's love. If the Mosaic laws are not for the good of the people God gave them to, well...let's just say I choose not to believe that God is perverse and COMPLETELY inscrutable from a human frame of reference.
I'm sure there's a lot of commentary in the Jewish tradition that might enlighten us on this topic. Rivka? Anyone?
If you're asking what I think you're asking, then I would say that the laws of kashrut and other such laws are primarily for spiritual, not physical reasons. However, there may be some health benefits -- that's a bonus. (Which is not to say that a kosher diet cannot be extremely unhealthy. Gribbenes -- the kosher answer to pork rinds -- are a good example of that.)
So it could easily be that a law is spiritually healthful, but physically not. (Although there is a tradition that physical harm cannot come to a person by doing a mitzvah (commandment). However, this is usually explained as only when the motivations are entirely pure. I cannot claim mine are -- but perhaps those of the aforementioned predeluvians were?)
To comment also on what Dagonee said, I'd like to add that in Jewish traditional exegesis, there are considered to be as many as 40 layers of meaning in the text. But one is always the p'shat, the plain (generally the literal) meaning. So these great ages can both have many non-literal lessons and still be literally true. (I don't know if they are or not -- I started an interesting discussion on the topic at my Sunday night class. I blame Hatrack! )
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Sure, Dags. Once you toss in the devine all bets are off.
Of course. After all, the devine's already out on DVD, so betting on it would be pointless.
The larger point is that without the divine, the whole text is obviously not true, since much of it takes place in direct contact with the divine.
Dagonee
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
That was such a good movie.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
rivka, what do you do when the non-literal interpretations appears to claim that the literal isn't possible or true?
It seems to me that this is certainly the case with the claim that the ages of the patriarchs CANNOT be taken literally, or least shouldn't be...
Sounds like you had an interesting discussion. Anything you can share?
Dag, I don't really see the spiritual side of your proposed explanations other than the assertion by you (and others) that the reason we don't live as long as the patriarchs is that we are not as spiritually close to God as they were.
I must be missing something. Is there more to that thesis?
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote: rivka, what do you do when the non-literal interpretations appears to claim that the literal isn't possible or true?
Bob, I think you're asking about mutually exclusive, yet valid, interpretations of the same piece of text? (For example: Rivka (the matriarch) was 3 when she married Yitzchak; no she was 13.) We say, "Eilu v'eilu divrei Elokim chayim -- This and this are both the words of God."
How can two mutually exclusive facts both be true? In the strictly historical sense, they can't. However, as the rabbi who teaches my class likes to say, the (written) Torah is primarily a source of inspiration -- its functions as history and Law are secondary. So both can be True without being true.
quote: Sounds like you had an interesting discussion. Anything you can share?
Not easily -- it connected to the piece we've been covering for the last few months (which is why I brought it up).
Posted by Promethius (Member # 2468) on :
Bob,
You apologized for earlier, but I think this topic has been far more interesting because of your posts. I dont really have much to add on this, I just like seeing what other people think. Look at me, lurking on my own topic Posted by Richard Berg (Member # 133) on :
Not about to read 3 pages of Genesis conjecturing, but a small correction from page 1:
quote:People ate healthier back then (not as much meat)
The human body was built for a hunter/gatherer diet. Agriculture provided cheap calories to spawn population growth, but the level of disease shown in post-agro skeletons (Mesoamerica is the usual source) is astoundingly higher than those of a few generations prior.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Dag, I don't really see the spiritual side of your proposed explanations other than the assertion by you (and others) that the reason we don't live as long as the patriarchs is that we are not as spiritually close to God as they were.
I must be missing something. Is there more to that thesis?
I don't know. We got bogged down in the details and never explored them.
Dagonee Edit: On re-reading this sounds snarky. It wasn't meant to be, but I posted right after I checked my grades and didn't get them, about two minutes after I woke up. Sorry if it sounds snarky - I wasn't blaming you for the lack of details.
[ June 23, 2004, 08:29 AM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
OK, I've had a whole metro ride to think about this. The implication is not that we are spiritually farther from God. The key is that after the Fall, EVERY aspect of our lives changed. We are not living any aspect of the life that was planned and given to us. Granted, these lives are after the Fall, but the implication throughout the Bible is that God moved much more directly in the world and through his people.
Speculating on the mechanism helps you think of different ways that difference could manifest. If it was some way of living based on knowledge given by God, that says one thing. If it was direct intervention by God in particular people's lives, it says another.
Some of the patriarchs were said to "walk with God." Was this a poetic device suggesting they followed the Lord's path? Or did it mean something more basic, that these people were accompanied by God in some substantive, but probably not physical, way? Did this have anything to do with the longevity?
Death is said to have come about because of the Fall. Was this a punishment? The withdrawal of a particular gift that went along with the Garden? Was it a property of the Garden? Or was it intrinsic to humanity, a quality voluntarily relinquished?
I think each of these alternatives is an aspect of the entire truth which is inaccessible to us, both because of the inherent weakness of language and the lack of particular knowledge. In other words, the Truth, in its entirety, is not comprehendible to us. But small parts of the Truth are understandable when examined separately. And each examination helps the mind aprehend the whole in a slightly more complete way.
None of these speculations can be confirmed. But by examining each one as if it were true, we can ask, "what are the implications if this were true?" Each implication can be compared to other implications derived from other aspects of Scriptures and examined to see if it's likely to be part of the truth.
Jesus taught in parables, in stories that were not true but were True. This is one of the reasons I love Tolkein so much - he presents alternative ways of looking at things that are not accurate, but contain reflections of the Truth in them. It's not that any of these ideas on the longevity can be proven true. It's that each one, if true, can help us to think about God's word in a new way.
And there's always the possibility that these actual people did not live these actual lifespans, and that the stories are there merely to inspire the type of examination I've been talking about. But I'm sure that some people somewhere lived lives much longer (maybe only 100 years) than was normal, and that this had something to do with their relationship to the Lord. And that contemplating this fact, and the reasons for it, is a valuable means of examining the Scripture.
Dagonee
[ June 23, 2004, 08:30 AM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by beverly (Member # 6246) on :
Interesting discussion. I have always been in the camp of those that believe their lifespans really were that long and that something significant changed after the flood. I don't claim to have any theories on what that change might have been, but I was intrigued with the suggestion that God decided, and stated so, that He would shorten the time allowed each man on the earth.
I have also thought the paralleles to the Numenoreans were interesting. Since I believe there is a great deal of scripture that we don't have and much that has not been revealed to us, it doesn't seem strange at all to me to think there might be so much more going on here than we know about.
I am also of the belief that in Adam and Eve's time, the land of Earth was gathered into one land-mass (Pangea) and that the only information we have on the land-mass being divided is a couple of old-testament mentions:
quote: Gen. 10: 25
25 And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg•; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan.
1 Chr. 1: 19 mostly says the same thing. There is also in the creation story of Genesis the statement of the waters being gatherered together in one place, and mentions (in LDS scripture only) of the land being brought back together to be as it was before it was divided. (This would be after Christ's Second Coming, I think.)
Surely if this is the case (rather sudden continental drift) there must be quite a story behind it! But it is just briefly glossed over. (I have no idea how many other people of different Old-Testament-believing religions believe this also or if this is unique to LDS teachings.)
This also reminds me of the occurence of "giants" in the old testament. We certainly don't see people walking around these days the stature of Goliath. But this story, like the mentions of age and other fantastic stories can definitely seem to some like just another example of "tall tales" being passed down from generation to generation.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I'm pretty sure Pangaea broke up long before human beings evolved.
The best explanations I've ever heard for the various catastrophes in Genesis (including the flood) is that they were local events affecting the Mediterranean area, for example.
Otherwise, you really do have to come up with a plausible explanation for the remaking/reshaping of the Earth in such a short time frame and the unlikely survival of ANY life upon it. The only explanation would be some outside force making it work. The problem is that there's so much evidence of gradual change and no evidence of that much rapid change circa 12,000 to 6,000 years ago.
Sure, God could have done it. But the physical evidence suggests that God did NOT do it at all. The only evidence in favor of this rapid overwhelming change comes from a written account of oral history, made many many years after the actual events.
By the way, rivka, I understand the "this is true and this is also true," idea, but it seems just another way of tossing ones hands up in the air and saying "we don't get it."
It also puts scriptural evidence on a par with scientific evidence. Which seems odd to me given that one is something we can actually replicate and generate testable hypotheses from and the other is an appeal to authority about which we know little and can't really test anything.
The two are at their root mutually incompatible views of the way evidence works.
I think I like the separate magesteria approach a lot better. It says, for example, that if you want to know about the Earth, study geology, if you want to know about God, study theology. And don't try to mix the two because the result doesn't work intellectually.
Oh well. I probably can't be convinced of the value of a different approach because I think the alternatives are fairly unsatisfactory in that they either don't resolve questions or they require too much "looking sideways" at the science or the theology, or both.
I just don't think we can have it both ways and still have functional science and functional theology.
I haven't seen a blend yet that works, at any rate.
Maybe someone someday will surprise me.
Actually, I'd go further to say that science is a great way to study God and how God did things. It still doesn't answer why or with what purpose in mind. And it never will, I don't think.
I think our knowledge of natural science is also a good way to decide which parts of Scripture are likely to have mostly allegorical meaning -- pointing us to look at the stories differently and see what we can gleen from them other than the literal meaning which is contradicted by the available scientific evidence.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
But I think the parts which are "contradicted by scientific evidence" are precisely those parts which need the most attention paid, because they are good indications that something different happened.
It's not like the people who wrote it didn't know that what they were writing was not representative of the natural norm. Science hasn't discovered anything that makes any part of the Bible more or less miraculous.
Dagonee
Posted by beverly (Member # 6246) on :
Yeah, I'm cool with scientific evidence leaning in another direction. That is the case against a lot of Biblical accounts. But I am content that there is much of our universe that "science" does not see.
*Again sympathizes with agnostics.*
Posted by Yozhik (Member # 89) on :
quote:25 And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg•; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan.
I see it as more likely that this verse refers to a dividing up of the area by different population groups or families, and not to Pangaea at all.
Noah's descendants had to divide the land between them, which implies that they couldn't get along well enough to share the same land. The hope for a return to an Edenic state of harmony (after the cleansing of the flood) was thwarted by human nature.
Posted by Yozhik (Member # 89) on :
quote:We certainly don't see people walking around these days the stature of Goliath.
Doesn't most of the NBA come close? Posted by ak (Member # 90) on :
It's interesting that I can see and sympathize with Bob's position totally. I agree that people who say things like, "evolution didn't happen, we don't share a common ancestor with cats or chimps or chipmunks or protozoa, and I know that because of this text in my holy book," are on a dead-end path. The pope tried that with Copernicus and Gallileo, and it just didn't turn out to be a very useful approach to the universe. I think the current attempt by some churches to put on blinders and deny Darwin is exactly the same thing. Another example I read was the founder of the Hari Krishna movement, Sri Prabhupada, a wise and holy man, saying that the other stars were not suns in their own right, they shone by the light of the sun. Obviously there is some meaning in the passage he cites from his holy text to back that up, but I can't see it as an accurate guide for astronomical theories.
However, there IS a very fruitful way of interacting with the stories of the Bible, and it involves being open to the possibility of their truth on many levels, not excluding their literal truth. As God is authoring the universe, there isn't really any limit to his ability to affect how things happen here, other than the limits he puts on himself. So we study both science and religion to learn about the universe. They complement each other and don't conflict.
In other words, God COULD HAVE created the universe in 7 days with all species pre-formed, but the study of geology, astronomy, paleontology, and so on teach us that He did not choose to do so.
His story makes sense on many levels, and I personally believe that when a miracle occurs, no laws of the universe are being violated, but rather because of His deep knowledge of physics and everything else, He can figure out how to make things happen however He wants. In the same way that a walkie talkie would seem miraculous to a society of primitive hunter gatherers, the miracles seem miraculous to us, but are things we could understand, were we developed enough mentally and spiritually.
Another thing that seems to be true is that when God intervenes into reality, there is always some alternative explanation for what happens besides direct divine intervention. Whether this is so people won't be so terrified or what, I'm not sure. Maybe it's just an aesthetic thing, avoidance of the deus ex machina in His work of art, because that's a cheap device and He's a higher level of artist than that. Or maybe there are reasons beyond our ken. It does seem to be the way it works, though.
[ June 23, 2004, 09:09 PM: Message edited by: ak ]
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote: By the way, rivka, I understand the "this is true and this is also true," idea, but it seems just another way of tossing ones hands up in the air and saying "we don't get it."
Then I didn't explain it very well.
Our brains are not binary, the way computers are. They are associative -- neural nets. That allows us to believe two contradictory things simultaneously. For example, that Person X is both an insufferable idiot, and one of the nicest people I've ever met. A binary or more linear brain would make that difficult or impossible, I think.
I think this is deliberate: God wants us to develop the ability to tolerate and deal with ambiguity. Not too much -- believing too many contradictory things sounds a lot like insanity -- but also not limiting ourselves to strictly linear thinking.
Accordingly, the Torah contains things which are straightforward and direct, and things which are deliberately ambiguous, where we are MEANT to develop our deductive reasoning. (Of course, there may be some argument as to which parts are which.)
It's not just saying "we don't know" -- it's saying "we don't NEED to know" or even "it is better that we do not know, because it allows us to glean multiple lessons from the single text" -- going back to those 40 levels of meaning I mentioned. Dagonee said
quote: But by examining each one as if it were true, we can ask, "what are the implications if this were true?"
and I agree entirely.
quote: It also puts scriptural evidence on a par with scientific evidence. Which seems odd to me given that one is something we can actually replicate and generate testable hypotheses from and the other is an appeal to authority about which we know little and can't really test anything.
Oh no, not at all. It puts scriptural evidence above scientific evidence. But that's ok, science is getting better all the time.
I am familiar with the separate magesteria approach, and on a practical level (i.e., when I teach science classes), I basically agree with it. And I think that many of the books that try to reconcile the two viewpoints not only fail miserably, but are both bad science and bad theology.
However, on a purely personal level, I disagree. The way I look at the world is inextricably tied both to my religious beliefs and my interest in, and knowledge of, science. And I wouldn't have it any other way.
[edit: stupid homophones get me every time]
[ June 23, 2004, 03:49 PM: Message edited by: rivka ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
rivka. Well said.
Posted by beverly (Member # 6246) on :
Yohzik, I expect that that is the general interpretation of that passage of scripture. Taken alone, it makes the most sense. I don't have a firm idea in my mind that it definitely is talking about continental divide, but with the other passages I am thinking of, I lean in that direction.
Yeah, on the subject of giants, the NBA came to my mind too.
Just out of curiosity, about when was the concept of a continental divide first being explored? I have no idea.
Ak, your thoughts are pretty close to how I feel about things. I have never felt that evolution and creation are mutually exclusive.
And, Rivka, ditto on what you said also!
[ June 23, 2004, 03:51 PM: Message edited by: beverly ]
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
quote: Our brains are not binary, the way computers are. They are associative -- neural nets. That allows us to believe two contradictory things simultaneously. For example, that Person X is both an insufferable idiot, and one of the nicest people I've ever met. A binary or more linear brain would make that difficult or impossible, I think.
I really don't think that's a logical conclusion. The wiring might be binary, but the program could likely handle it.
Interesting thoughts, however. Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
<-- not logical
<-- associative
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Dag, well said!
Actually, rivka, in the history of Hatrack your last is among my 10 favorite posts. It bumped out one of my own puns, so you know it must be near and dear to my heart.
And mind.
And I agree 101%
<----not logical either.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Was it just my kudos to rivka that were well said? I mean, I'm happy to be known as a rivka cheerleader, but a fella still wants some recognition in his own right. Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Oh, sorry. Nice tip of the hat too!
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
I have cheerleaders?
I find it amusing -- but not particularly surprising -- that Bob greatly enjoyed my one-liner (well, I guess it was technically a two-liner) more than the post that took me half an hour to compose. Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Unless you're just kidding around, you mistook me, rivka. I was absolutely applauding your longer post. It seriously is one of the most perfect things that has ever been posted on Hatrack.
And it's taken you a lifetime to post it, not just a half hour. You put your knowledge and experience in it, neh?
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
*blink* Oh, I did misunderstand, Bob. Thanks for the clarification.
quote: And it's taken you a lifetime to post it, not just a half hour.
Oh, man! At that rate I will NEVER get caught up on Hatrack!
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Speaking of catching up, I should have half your posts soon, rivka. Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Just do like me and post without attempting to be clear or precise. It sparks such interesting conversations.
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