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Merged (edited) General thoughts about Christianity and the bible

Helen said:
All early European translations of the bible are problematic; they have become part of our cultures, which is more or less the only reason people think the language sounds so poetic, and striking. They're not very good translations, though, the people translating them simply didn't know enough about the languages they were translating from, and, sometimes, weren't all that great at their own language either. If you find KJV compelling, it's not because it's so good, but because it's what you are accustomed to think of as  the translation. The same is true of, for instance, Karl XII's bible here in Sweden. And people in Sweden didn't understand it back then either, which of course made it seem even more impressive...
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Translations of the Bible are no more problematic than what they were translated from. The original sources were worse. Newer translations are worse too because they 'correct' the Bible with 'better' translations and/or 'modernized' language in a futile attempt to make it more 'accurate' and 'understandable'. This is like changing Shakespeare's plays to better match the source material and rewriting them in modern English.

The best version of the KJV is the KJV, and the best version of the Karl XII is the Karl XII. Anything else is problematic.
 
Gord_in_Toronto said:
I think it may be in the head. There's lots of evidence that when you cut of someone's head their mind stops working. (Though this is just a theory.) :con2:
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That depends on your definition of 'mind'. If you confine it to internal operation of the human brain then yes, it's in the head alone.

Wikipedia says:-
The mind is that which thinks, feels, perceives, imagines, remembers, and wills. It covers the totality of mental phenomena, including both conscious processes, through which an individual is aware of external and internal circumstances, and unconscious processes, which can influence an individual without intention or awareness. The term mind is sometimes used in a narrow meaning to refer only to cognitive functions associated with perception, reasoning, awareness, and memory.
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But,
Theories under the umbrella of externalism emphasize the mind's dependency on the environment... The extended mind thesis states that external circumstances not only influence the mind but are part of it. In this sense, a diary is part of the mind by helping it store information. Similarly, an electronic calculator is part of the mind by helping it perform calculations.
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There's no doubt that our conscious thoughts, reasoning and memories are greatly influenced by outside factors, particularly interactions with others via language. That sharing of thoughts creates a collective consciousness that extends beyond the body. Cutting off a few heads doesn't stop that mind from working.

The authors of the Bible copied parts of their minds into the book. When others read it that goes into their minds, making them think and behave the same. Modern communications technology is making this effect stronger. We now have AI collecting all the thoughts we expressed on the internet and feeding it back to us. People are doing less thinking for themselves and more relying on the 'collective mind' to do it for them, much like religions did in earlier times.

Theoretically there could be a time in the future when all humans have died but their minds remain inside the machines. The time when people start putting their minds inside robots may not be far off.
 
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Philipse concludes (1) that theism cannot be stated meaningfully; (2) that if theism were meaningful, it would have no predictive power concerning existing evidence, so that Bayesian arguments cannot get started; and (3) that if the Bayesian cumulative case strategy did work, one should conclude that atheism is more probable than theism.
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Rusty? Are you going to check this out?
 
Roger Ramjets said:
Translations of the Bible are no more problematic than what they were translated from. The original sources were worse. Newer translations are worse too because they 'correct' the Bible with 'better' translations and/or 'modernized' language in a futile attempt to make it more 'accurate' and 'understandable'. This is like changing Shakespeare's plays to better match the source material and rewriting them in modern English.

The best version of the KJV is the KJV, and the best version of the Karl XII is the Karl XII. Anything else is problematic.
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Not really true. Getting closer to the original texts, whichever texts we're talking about, is good. There are many translations made by non-theistic academics, that are not aimed at making the original texts more palatable, just more accurate - in the process, often showing how weird and contradictory the original texts really are.

And as for Shakespeare, those of us who are not primarily anglophone get new translations from time to time, which are definitely better and closer to the original texts, than the early translations. I think many Englush schoolchildren, and others, woukd really benefit from a more modern version to read alongside the original, to be able to appreciate the bard guy.

Translating these days bebefits greatly from the development of the sciences it relies on. Getting closer to the original texts is never bad, in my opinion. The older translations of the bible will still be of cultural value, but getting more accurate versions to base criticisms of the texts on seems a very good thing. As you say, the original sources were worse.
 
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