I don't find it impossible for "god" things and "gods" to fall into derivative. My whole point here is that they should derive from something. I just don't agree with the contention that all there is, and could possibly be, to know about god concepts is done and dusted.

Because there is no human modelling of the universe without thought. If you're going to question everything about human modelling, why not the first thing?

Ad hoc, much?  Your assumption about some God other than those which relate back to natural phenomena that humans didn't understand at that time is really the assumption here.  In every early representation of Gods and Goddesses, they all reflect natural things.  Interesting that C.S. Lewis' God was a Storm-God originally, of a pantheon that represented dawn, dusk, sunrise, and sunset, stars, moon, sun, and earth.  Also, ironically enough, women.  (An ancient puzzle that men still have not figured out)

Can you represent a God figure from early history that is void of all naturalism?

No I don't.

You say that like it's a bad thing

But seriously...

That's good, because... at risk of sounding now redundant after already having said it several times - I'm not asking you to.

Well, you seem to have found satisfaction in the rest of my post so you can just ignore my information filtration analogy at your leisure, I was just advancing a thought experiment on emergence which has no great bearing on the conclusion. Regardless of how you paint emergence there is always going to be a dependence on a field of true values.

Of course you can say thought is just a function of the human brain, but it really is naiive to isolate the brain from it's environment, inasmuch rendering a nil value to the universe from which it emerged and calling it a universe unto itself, it's an implicit dualism. If you're going to separate the brain from the universe the brain conceives showing how it is separated is really rather important.

You've misunderstood what I meant; when I said true values I was referring to boolean values, material brains don't interact with non existing things, and it is not moved to thought by nothings. 

Then it would be better to have jut said gods are based on ignorances, surely. I don't disagree with this, gods are based on ignorances, fears and desires, among other things. We don't need to assert that we suffer any less from those ourselves, though, it doesn't make the original point any more or less matter of fact.

Okay, so a "god" is like a protective mandala in that sense: something to evoke when fearful? That's again a mechanism of mind, though.

Right, but no such creature actually exists.

Esoteric is bad if it leads to confusing yourself and your correspondents in a written debate. Try plain speaking instead and see how far your theories run when they are obliged to make obvious sense.

Just take your last sentence in your last post. What is "heralding" when it's at home? My dictionary allows a gerund form of the verb "to herald" (with the advice that it is never used). The verb itself means to announce or intimate something that is about to happen.

So am I to take it from your sentence that you think the unicorn symbolises the announcement or intimation of something about to happen and that this has "some" correspondence to the real world (like "things happen" maybe)?

Or did you mean heraldry - quite a different word and meaning semantically? And if you did am I to understand that you think the unicorn symbolises the practise of painting emblems on shields? In fact it is the opposite - it itself is a symbol commonly used in heraldry and symbolises faithfulness in that context.

Sloppy stuff - and that was just your last sentence. I could point out several more throughout your posts. They allude to meaning but employ words in archaic or non-existent forms that confuse or negate whatever meaning you thought you were trying to convey.

So instead of criticising so many people who have been genuinely trying to follow your reasoning (and not all of whom are dumb in any sense) for getting your meaning wrong, maybe you should ask yourself are you contributing to this confusion yourself with the needlessly esoteric and often inexact terms you employ.

Esoteric is fine if you're using your words properly in a grammatical and semantic sense. If not, well ... you're clever enough to know what the outcome is. And you're clever enough too to know just who uses this kind of communication technique intentionally to imply that their half-baked delusional theories should be regarded as profound - something that rational atheists find themselves having to deconstruct and expose all the time. I assume you don't want to be confused with them by your audience, so I suggest you switch style. Plain speaking does not mean dumbing down, and esoterism has its place. It's a question of honesty, not intellect, and as a communicator you don't want to run the risk of being accused of dishonesty when you're trying to tell the truth.

If your dictionary says 'heralding' as a form of 'to herald' is never used, wow, man... your dictionary really needs to read more technology press releases. I can't count the number of times I've read about this new chip or that new fabrication process 'heralding in a new era in computing'. It's not used casually, but yeah, it's definitely used.

As for the usage here... I'm guessing, given the reference to angelic heralds, that what she's referring to is unicorns as messengers, though I admit I'm not familiar with any tales of them serving that role. Gotta give him points on that one, Eloise, I think you've linguistically short-handed yourself into confusing ambiguity on that one.

Ehhhn.. I dunno. See, the critter usually referred to by westerners as a 'unicorn' in chinese folklore is a qilin, which is nothing like a western unicorn. For starters, it's got two horns. Antlers, really, on a lion's head. And scales. And more recently, it's been identified with the giraffe after Zheng He brought two of 'em back from Africa in the 1400s.

Yeah, but unicorn-as-horse is a fairly recent thing, going back maybe to the 1200s. Classical and biblical references certainly don't give that impression. The creature the KJV first translated as 'unicorn' is a symbol of strength, and following the descriptions and symbolism used in the neighboring cultures, probably a bull or an auroch (which, shown in profile as they often were, display a single horn). Other references either make the 'unicorn' much smaller than a horse, probably a goat (cloven hooves, bearded... fits pretty well), or a creature called an 'indian wild ass', which Pliny described as having a stag-like head, feet like an elephant, a horse-like body, and a tail like a boar. Now, given the fauna of the indian subcontinent, and the general shape of each of those components... narrowing head w/a small mouth, tufted tail, broad feet, and a basically (if much larger and heavier) horse-shaped body... and one horn... that's a rhinoceros.  Aelian even tells us that the 'monoceros' (unicorn) was also called the 'cartazonon', which is suspiciously similar to the Sanskrit word 'cartazoon' or 'karkadann' in Arabic... which is rhinoceros.

Nordmann  

Wise you are , but Eloise's writing style brings out the way we are, as we use all the constructs of language, mythology and science that have come before us. 

 .... and she is not dishonest , but good at it .... go teacher Eloise.    

   I appreciate Eloise for her appreciation of what we are .... so rooted in concepts and words .... go communication .... lol you all ....

  Yeah , kind of .... Eloise mocks so much of how we think and why ..... and that is a  lesson indeed, at least for me.     I would love to go fishing with her ! No no , camping and relaxing around the fire  .... looking at the stars .... and pondering it all  ....

But this is the point Nordmann, mythological and legendary concepts need to be understood as symbolic shorthands or renderings and they're all too frequently not.

I was going to put 'birth' there but I had second thoughts realising that would take way too much defending and I'm frankly not that committed to this argument right now, so I left a blank space there instead, sorry Nordmann, didn't expect the grammar police to be dropping by today .

Ah, but without the grammar police you would never have explained what on earth you were on about. Now at least I know that all you meant to say was that mythology and legend often contain shorthand references. This is true, though insignificant since one could say the same about any narrative, or indeed language itself, so it needs to be expanded on in order to make a point.

And it is interesting to see that you feel it is ok to posit arguments that you admit you have not much faith in. That is always useful to know when discussing ideas with someone.

Sharpening foibles is good !

Hey is there someone on here with artistic ability that can put up a picture of a furgo-argorock?

Er, insignificant? Are you projecting an intention to prove god with this argument on me again? 

Is it not enough for you I point out the special plead in declaring that theology is not a narrative like any other with reference to the real, just because 'gods' are involved in some form known not to exist? I mean would anyone who is happy to accept that Orwell's 1984 was a meaningful commentary not be a hypocrite in suggesting that the The Twelve Trials of Heracles cannot refer meaningfully to the existing world?

I do, but that's not really the case here. I'm just more committed to something else right now and I'm trying to keep it short in this thread, which hasn't been easy.

Special plead is a colloquial noun referring to a logical fallacy.

Uh? Um.. hello.. "God"

Now you really are being such a pedant here that we're not even having a discussion anymore, you're just gratifying your condescending sense of self importance and I'm having no part of it.  Enjoy talking yourself up to someone else.

Eloise, you're prancing around and telling everyone that every human conception is tied to reality in some way (nevermind that you can't do this with a concept like a Shootle, which can't be tied to reality at all, as we just finished establishing): and now you're saying that you aren't even willing to subject this claim to scrutiny?

Pray tell: how is this any different from a fundamentalist who insists that their literalist biblical worldview doesn't have to adhere to any logical standard?

"Special plead" is not a colloquial noun, unless a typo can be described as such. Google it and - hey presto - the typo is found on a website transcribing Carl Sagan's rules for sceptical thought as listed in his book "The Demon Haunted World". But yet you have obviously found this typo and chosen to claim it as real, you have even graced it with a title, calling anyone who doubts you a pedant. Now what type of person - I ask myself - normally exhibits such a cavalier attitude to meaning and a dogmatically judgmental attitude towards those who object to it?

And what's with the "Uh -um, hello... God" comment? God fits right in there with all the rest of the old myths which addressed the dichotomy between humans' ignorance and the need to master the reality of their universe. Why wouldn't it? It's one of the biggest examples of personification and glorification of ignorance there is.

My importance, self or otherwise, is no less or greater than yours, Eloise. We both set out our words and meanings here in the same manner and with the same general intent, that they be believed. I just like to keep mine real. I judge only the accuracy of your points, not you. If that is pedantry, then long live pedants. The alternative is that any old crap wll be put forward as having equal merit to rationally deduced fact. And that's simply a retreat into ignorance.

How many examples shall I link to demonstrate to your satisfaction that you are mistaken?

here

"A case against ‘anything goes’ epistemology, and the difficulties of the special plead"

second post down

Here's one that might surprise you

"Often this ad hoc explanation is nothing more than a special plead, dressed up to look like an argument."

I'm not going to say that has not, at least in some ways, got merit as an explanation, but it's still special pleading.

I mentioned pedantry when you ignored the accuracy of my statements in order to make whimsy about their presentation and then launch from that into yet another comment aimed at questioning my mental health. But, what the hell, have it your way, my idea of pedantry is you making a valid counterpoint.. Okay... moving on..

It was just a little mad rant IAM, it's not really important, but anyhow what I'm saying there is that it seems like it might be just too hard for some atheists to believe, because I am identifying as theist, that I would argue any subject without intending to end saying "therefore God exists".

I admit having some feeling for that idea IAM, I tend to believe people are more receptive to purging unreasonable beliefs in pieces rather than wholes. God belief especially can have so much of a traditional theists sense of acumen founded on it that ends up being just plain buried in Ad Hoc reinforcement, I don't think it's such a bad idea to target the reinforcement rather than the core belief.

Thanks E. That helped. I was thinking of re-writing (or re-working) some of your sentences etc, to increase prosperity !  Don't know if I will get around to it , but you have helped me in trying to be a uniter, and divider of rational and non-rational  thinking.

My skill is not much up to the task, but some might benefit .... Hope I am not giving any one brain cancer !   

I prefer jamming live vocally with words.  Maybe I will get a little digital recorder for that. Typing and live are so different and all so fun.

LOL,  E      

Didn't see "horse" in there anywhere?

Well Nordmann,  some can, some not  .... it's way blurry for me, but I sense something there !

      Symbols announce many things, even Heralds ! 

      Umm, is consciousness real ?

   ... glad to know that tap, on the nose, isn't sore !   

Yes, horse sounds like it should be a herald of sorts symbolically speaking, or at least carry one around now and again in Paul Revere fashion. But nope - apparently not, not even chimeratic horses.