Why I am not a Christian

[Whaleboy]

it doesn't have to be infinitesimal in depth it simply needs to be perfectly uniform throughout it's depth such that it is [/i]functionally[/i] 2d. In any case I don't understand why it would be infintesimal time if we are talking about something analgous to an animated 2d image.

Herein lies the difference between our positions. It would not be operating on our temporal dimension, but theirs which we perceive as spatial, hence any question of “animation” as we see is irrelevant. As it for being of infinitesimal depth, if one assumes the Planck constant doesn’t apply, then if it is two dimensional then it cannot have any depth as we think it, such an object could not have a molecular structure, nor any atomic composition, since atoms are three dimensional… hence we speak of 2-D in a familial sense but it is always theoretical. The square you might sketch on a pad of paper requires a depth of graphite in order that it can exist.

I had them operating along different time axis in every case but in the special case of a simulation there is only one 'real' time dimension and the 'time' dimension in the simulation is only apparent as such to the inhabitants.

I think you are assuming that where an additional dimension is concerned and environment that does not include that dimension must be of 0 dimensions with respect to it, but really it only needs to be totally uniform with respect to that dimension.

In the first case the problem with the examples we can perceive is that the hypothetical time dimension we give them is not perpendicular to our own (Einsteinian dimensions being of course perpendicular to each other, spacetime being a function of the Cartesian coordinates and time… represented as dl^2 = c dt^2 – dx^2 – dy^2 – dz^2 (note how similar it is to the Pythagorean theorem. “dl^2” is the separation of two points in four dimensional spacetime, hence you can see the effect of adding a fifth dimension to this spacetime (time becomes spatially perceptible and thus 4d time becomes rather like a 2D square, see above, to a cube, as opposed to a hypercube which is your take on my argument… n-1 is perceptible to n as spatial if the temporal dimension of n-1 is spatial to n).

As a side note, totally uniform would seem to preclude any communication, but that deduction isn’t strictly related here.

We can appear to share all 3 dimensions (including time) used by the 3d environment of the side scroller game and it is not in any way infintesimal or inobservable to us, but by displaying the output in a different way and removing the need for input from such a side scroller, the entire thing could be viewed as a static unchanging set of information with no 'real' dimensions whatsoever. If the program was sophisticated enough to include snetient beings who operate within the simulated environment they too would appaer as static unchanging sets of information but might nonetheless be sentient within their simulated environment.

But the game would still be 4d in the strict sense because it is perceptible to us on the same timeframe, though it’s spatial dimensions are 3 (as ours) hence we might communicate with any life form inside. Take away the light and remove the need for input etc and all you have is a series of images displayed at a rate of 24 / second. We might use it as an analogy for life in lesser dimensions but because the difference is not perpendicular (i.e., all you are doing is saying that it cannot perceive beyond the TV) but the analogy falls apart later because it is still residing in 4-dimensions.

To simplify, imagine you have a pencil. Is it 3d or 4d? Common sense tells you that it’s 3d, but then time as we perceive it has an effect upon it, both on the quantum level (charge and spin) and on the relative level (one end of the pencil is subject to a different relative time to another because of different relative position in the universe). It is a 4-dimensional object.

It is possible that special relativity would not apply to measurements made between two points separated only by 5th dimensional space.

Of course, because effectively as far as space-time is concerned my “pencil” occupies a single point in 5-D spacetime and is not a physical object in the 5-d sense.

Yes it certainly would require such advance knowledge. but it would be possible for God (if arbitrarily intelligent) to know all that in advance if our environment were totally deterministic from his point of view. And in the case of a simulation in particular, it certainly could be.

Good point. One assumes an infinite regress of uncertainty principle is at work in 4-dimensions, hence the total knowledge of the velocity and the position of every particle in the universe at any one instant is impossible to us humans, but make time spatial so each possible path in the sum-over-histories sense is known (omniscience = infinity), so the only way to know everything in the universe for the universe to be totally deterministic is to take it to 5D. Oh dear. Can’t do anything with it! That God is supposedly infinite here is my assumption, if God is finite to us then obviously none of this applies to him.

In the example of the twin paradox, the 5th dimensional observer simply has access to an absolute frame of reference.

That’s only for special relativity which assumes that for two any two events, dl^2 is the same for all observers travelling in inertial frames of unaccelerated motion. Take a square root and the time coordinates would differ from the spatial coordinates by a factor of i. Take that to 5 dimensions, if the 4th and 5th dimensions could know of each other, and the absolute frame of reference in 5, then a finite speed of light and relative time would be refuted, hence the twins paradox would not occur for our 5-d observer. Of course, by my logic, in 5d the different times are merely spatial for the paradox, but then the notion of a 5-d observer is a self-defeating one as previously discussed.

In fact i think brain in the jar ideas are just a special case of this broader notion of perceived reality existing within an almost totally unrelated 'actual reality'.

Reminds me of some Buddhist takes on Solipsism… are you familiar?

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by bayraven
I would assume, no.

You would be correct, and in conflict with Leviticus.

was Herodotus a prophet? He would have to be to talk about the emperors.

Forgive me...I was confusing him with Tacitus.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by bayraven
I was relying on information I've been studying that said nothing had been refuted by archaeology (etc.). I was fishing for info to the contrary. thanks.

NP. I'm sure there are apologetics written for every conceivable inconsistency in the Bible, however. Just keep in mind that apologetics aren't good history or scholarship--they are speculative justifications for people's prejudices, nothing more. I've seen the most tortuous explanations from apologists wrt to the historical inaccuracies in Daniel, not to mention the bizarre attempts to explain a global Flood as being phyically possible.

I'll also mention that his been noted by scholars that virtually every page of the Bible, both OT and NT, contains grammatic errors. Some can be dismissed as copy errors. Others as poetic license, I suppose. But considering the number, you would think an inerrant text would not be grammatically incorrect at all.

the ziggurat didn't exist or the effect on language didn't occur?

First and foremost the language effect, certainly.

The ziggurat question is harder to answer, because there were many, many such structures built all over Mesopotamia in the ancient era. Who could say if one of these was an inspiration for the story of the tower or not?

In your first post today you spoke to my main concern. That would be the contention that the bible should not be trashed as 'nothing more than religious propaganda.' I will seek and source the objections you've raised to it's veracity.

I do not think anything in the Bible should be "trashed," whatever that means. Even John, though I believe it is a highly contentious document, provides some insight into the psychology and ideas of the time. I just don't think it or the NT should be treated as historical works, but rather religious ones that have a clear agenda and biases. We do the same for historians, after all.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by bayraven
Really ? bored people, squinting, working by candlelight, day after day after day after day ... errors occurred at a high rate in comparable copying processes.

I am not sure which comparable processes you referred to.

Working by candlelight is just an image popularised by public media, these people had a tendency to go sleep early. And of course there were checkers, because the book was holy to them.

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by bayraven
Jon,
I was asking for non-biblical MSS from 100-300 AD to compare the accuracy rate VS the Bible. Since the site you posted (which is most helpful btw) was in support of the accuracy of the Bible, can I assume that you were talking about Bible-related-writings when you referenced the accuracy of works from that period?

One site I read talked about other books accuracy rate.

I don't remember what the address was right now, it was a google search though.

Jon Miller

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
If you take the literal account of the Flood as true, it has been overwhelmingly shown to be false by archaeology and geology.

Linguists and archaeologists would tell you that the Tower of Babel has been proven to not be true.

And, once again, the biology and paleontology has shown that the literal account of Genesis is simply not true.

Daniel also is wrong about several aspects of the history it presents, particularly the date Nebuchadnezzar came to Jerusalem and the name of the Median king, as well as the identity of the last king of Babylon (the OT claims he was Nebuchadnezzar's son and successor, but he was not even related, nor was he a direct successor, there having been several intermediary kings).

Biblical inerrancy is a non-starter for all but the most ludicrous of apologists.

There were also a few I remember off the top of my head, including:

1. The Israelis were in Egypt for 49 years, not 70 years.
2. The Romans didn't have a census in Judea around the alleged time of birth of Jesus of Nazareth.
3. AFAIK, there were no mysterious deaths of Egyptian first borns.
4. King Herod didn't go around killing babies.

[Jon Miller]

umm

actually most scholarship that I have read don't think that the Israelis had a national idenity during the time period that they were in Egypt

it is thought that what became the jews was one of the groups who came in when egypt was not ruled by egyptians (I think the group began with an h)

and left about the time that egyptians took back rule

Jon Miller

[Boris Godunov]

I don't think anyone knows at all how long the Israelis were supposedly in Egypt. In fact, I could swear that the most recent scholarship was raising serious doubts as to whether there was any such Exodus in the first place. I think one theory is that Moses was a slave who killed his master, fled to Israel and took over a nomadic tribe...or something like that.

[Boris Godunov]

Re: Herod...yeah, I had forgotten about that one. It does seem quite odd that Josephus, who was keen to print every single bad thing Herod did, would utterly neglect the slaughter of the innocents. I mean, Josephus notated crimes of Herod far less heinous.

What seems to have happened is that the author of Mark decided to add the story in to "fulfill" a prophecy in Jeremiah, and to do so he seems to have just reworked the story from Moses' nativity, a scene that no doubt left a powerful impression on the minds of Jewish people.

[Kuciwalker]

Time for this to die.

[Boris Godunov]

La comedia...e finita!

[Whaleboy]

Oooh!! Do I get the last word? Three and a half bloody weeks... honestly

[Boris Godunov]

No, I am getting the last word.

[Serb]

"Why I am not a Christian"

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