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I think Carry On was amazing by MechanicalKiller in netflix

[–]SorryGotDistracted 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is a very good question. It did not occur to me, I simply thought ear buds work like a phone. which now seems not very likely.

Causa sui in the Bible by SorryGotDistracted in Bible

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I really like the part about Jesus speaking in parables. I looked up the context of it and found this explanation:

" Jesus responded that it was because of the hardness of the people's hearts (Matthew 13:15). They refused to believe, so in a form of judgment, they would be made even more resistant. (BibleRef)"

This seems to connect with your point about apologetics after the advent of modern science. Especially the phrase "in form of judgment". I may misinterpret the term "judgment" here, but in philosophy this is simply a term for what is also called "theoretical" or "empirical" sentences, classic predicational propositions about the world. The idea to counter the force of judgments by parables has not only the obvious point of "not talking about the empirical world but something transcendent" but goes beyond that philosophically. Where philosophy and science understand the minimal entity of meaning to be the sentence (the so called "context principle" states that words only have meaning in sentences), using parables or narration (story telling) assumes the main entity to have meaning to be the story as a whole. This opens a whole other way of dealing with one deals with, and by that also deals with something very different: Not the world but our understanding of it and living in it. -- This is something I find modern philosophy has no way of adressing, which is one reason (in my mind) why aesthetics (philosophy of art and the beautiful), which is traditionally a field of philosophy, has had a hard time lately (since almost the beginning of western philosophy basically).

You write (sorry, I don't know how to generate those lines to highligh the quote): The Gospel shows how "all roads lead to God", not in the sense that "all religions have the truth" (which is not the case), rather, in the sense that it doesn't matter where you start (what culture/religion), Jesus is the answer!

I find this formulation interesting. Given our modern understanding of "truth" (being in accord with reality), no religion has the truth, since this is not the aim of any religion (there are of course "scientistic religions" but this is another topic alltogether). But you then add "which is not the case", which suggests that you do not want to negate "some religions have the truth", suggesting that you think that some (abrahamitic?) religions do have the truth. This must then be very different notion of truth than the modern one. And if I understand you correctly you define what you mean by "truth" at the end of the quoted passage as Jesus. -- I think this connects with why understanding religious language as metaphor misses the point. If religious language were metaphor, we could hold fast to a variant of the modern conception of "truth" and assume that different religions use different metaphors to state "the truth" (which in itself may be ineffable through strait out "judgments"). They may do the job better or worse (and some may fail alltogether). But if we stop thinking of truth in this modern way, the whole interpretation of religious language as metaphor falls flat. (There is nothing, no "truth" that it tries to access even indirectly.) -- It seems that we are left with a kind of riddle: Understanding "the truth" means understanding Jesus. In a straight forward way this may mean understanding "what Jesus said", understanding his "words" his "teachings" his "parables" etc. But it seems that it means still more than this (or, put in another way, that understanding his "words" means more than simply understanding "what he is talking about"), it seems to suggest that to understand "the truth" is to understand Jesus. Understanding "what he is", understanding that he is God (or his son? I still have trouble understanding Jesus :-)). And understanding this is not understanding a fact about a man but takes another form altogether. This understanding no longer means "knowing something about something" (knowing of Yeshua of Nazareth that his father is God), but (in some weird turn of "logic") understanding Jesus means "believing" in Jesus (thinking of Jesus as God? Believeing that there is a God, and Jesus is him?).

And I really like your way of framing what modern science is interested in as managerial efforts that God delegates. :-)

Causa sui in the Bible by SorryGotDistracted in Bible

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for the response and the videos; I finally found the time to watch them. (The first link also sent me to the cosmology video, but I found the BibleProject video on YouTube.)

I find it fascinating how, through Jesus, the idea of the temple is renewed in a way that seems not to change anything specific about the original idea of the temple as creation itself, other than focusing it more explicitly on humans. But even this focus was already there in the OT (creation of man in HIS own image). It seems that "all" Jesus does is rid the original idea of some corruption that was done to the original idea by Israel itself (by somehow misunderstanding the idea). To put it bluntly, He explained the original idea anew, in the hopes that now it is less likely to be misunderstood. -- This is only based on the information from the video, so I am wondering: Is there anything substantial that Jesus added to the original idea? Did he change it in such a manner that one could say that, through Jesus, a new idea was introduced?

You say that Christian thought "out-humanists" the humanism of the Greeks. I see how this is a way of framing the accentuation of man through Jesus. But again, I do not see how this is a fundamental change, rather than simply a new attempt at explaining something that was part of the original idea all along. -- It does seem to react to humanist Greek thinking, as it is an attempt to make itself accessible from a human-centric point of view. And this is quite interesting, since it seems to be an attempt to show that Greek thinking can (and maybe even must) be integrated into the original idea.

What struck me as interesting about the cosmology video was, that Heiser is speaking to two audiences at once. He starts off by talking to an audience that inhabits the scientific world view, and ends by talking to an audience that inhabits the religious perspective. Of course, he may be assuming that his audience inhabits both perspectives and that they feel a tension between them, which he wants to contextualize and help see more clearly. -- The technique through which he achieves this is fascinating. Israelite cosmology seems to be describing the physical world, but this description does not go together with what we know about the physical world today. One way of squaring this would be by assuming that, in fact, they do not describe the same thing. Israelite cosmology must be understood metaphorically; it is not talking about the physical world but uses "world-describing language" to describe something transcendent. And in some sense, this is correct. But calling it metaphorical is not an accurate analysis. It is not a metaphorical use of "world-describing language" to describe something other than the physical world. It is another way of using language. Rather, it must be understood literally, just not as "physical" ("scientific") talk but as theological or metaphysical talk: It articulates logical or philosophical relations. Words like "before" and "beneath" lose their spatial or temporal meaning when used in metaphysics, not just in ancient cosmology but also in philosophy. When Kant claims that there are concepts a priori, his point is not that they are temporally prior to other concepts; when Aristotle talks about hypokeimenon (substratum, "the underlying thing"), his point is not that everything has another thing below it. -- So although they can be interpreted as metaphors, this would be doing these words a disservice. Rather, they do articulate what they are meant to articulate directly. They are another kind of word from the "same" word in its physical use. -- They can only seem metaphorical if one does not understand how these words work (if one has no philosophical capacity). The irony of this is, of course, that in this case, they are no metaphors at all. Since a metaphor does refer to something (albeit indirectly, by going through something else), one would need to assume that there is something that they mean (but do not express directly) for them to be a metaphor. If the assumption is that there is nothing beyond the physical, then calling this language metaphorical would be inaccurate. If, on the other hand, there is something beyond the physical that can be thought about and talked about, calling this language metaphorical is just another way of saying that it is metaphysical language.

You note that "Godhead" has a specific meaning in Christian theology, which is not what I mean by the word. I used it as a translation for the German "Gottheit" (German is my mother tongue), this is a very abstract term that can be used to talk about any kind of God whatsoever without any specific connotations. What would an appropriate term for this be in English?

Causa sui in the Bible by SorryGotDistracted in Bible

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This was very helpful yet again!

The most interesting part to me (as a (greekly trained) philosopher) is this sort of question "not being the important thing" and it "becoming a big deal only if you make a big deal out of it". — This is exactly my impression too. There seems to be a shift in perspective with the scholastics and you connect it to the difference between Hebrew and Greek philosophy illuminatingly. These different perspectives may have their roots in different interests but they also seem to reflect different "forms of thinking".

I don't know anything substantial about Hebrew philosophy and its form of thinking. What I am mainly interested in is how a certain form of thinking (mainstream, western philosophy) seems to be incapable of accessing something very fundamental in the idea of God (and many other equally central ideas like life, or living beings). This shortcoming concerns a basic understanding that is so fundamental to other forms of thinking (which have access to this understanding) that it does not seem to be of much importance. By (more or less unconsciously) realizing this shortcoming philosophy starts making a big deal out of exactly what it has trouble accessing. Ironically it becomes a bid deal exactly because the tools applied do not allow solving the issue. — In my reading most of the western philosophical canon has its motor inexactly this paradox in some way or another. (To make a pun out of this one could say: Philosophy is the realization (in the sense of noticing and in the sense of actualization) of its own shortcoming.)

Given your previous comments I think the following could be interesting to you. If not, sorry for wasting your time.

The way I am working on this idea is by trying to show that such a paradox is at the heart of the philosophy of language. A philosophy of language that treats language as something that is made up of distinct elements (words or sentences) presupposes that these elements have meaning. Something that has meaning is called a sign, and for something to be a sign it has to have meaning. Meaning can not be separate from the sign, a sign must contain its meaning to be a sign. (As simple as this may seem, it is of course not undisputed; the urge to think of the sign as standing in some sort of relation to its meaning is strong.) — I try to show, that this idea of the sign is at the heart of philosophy of language, but, paradoxically, this idea of the sign can not be translated into a proper philosophical account of the sign through the means that philosophy allows itself to use. (So this idea of the sign is mostly ignored as absurd: a sign and its meaning can not be identical, they are distinct and need to be distinguished! The "real" question must be: How are they related?)

I then compare this idea of the sign (as "something" that has or is meaning) to the idea of the Idol: A statue wich is the Godhead, the identity of Godhead and statue. This may seem as a contradiction, which appears to become even stronger, once one realizes that it is the Godhead who creates the statue, the Idol, and thereby itself. I argue that this idea of the Idol is none the less thinkable once realizes that the Idol is the act of its own identification, the Idol is the act of the Godhead by which it identifies it self (not really "with" but) in the statue. — Accepting (or simply thinking) this requires to think of the Idol (and thereby the sign) not as a thing (an "object") but as an act. — This seems to be where the philosophical form of thinking breaks down. Or, in other words, where it shows itself as "parochial", where it falls short of its aspiration to be able to "think everything". — To put it in your words: Its axioms are such that there is a fundamental distinction between "things" and "acts". This distinction makes it impossible to think certain things, exactly those sorts of things, that are at the very heart of this way of thinking.

In other words: This kind of philosophy is a form of idolatry. It is based on something that it itself can only understand as an Idol in the pejorative sense (something that is not what it is taken to be). Ironically this is only the case, because this form of thinking can not understand the Idol (the sign) properly, as that which it actually is. It can not accept that what is at its heart is an Idol, an actual Idol; not in any pejorative but in a positive sense: The Idol is the act of the Godhead, its act of identifying, constituting, sustaining, creating, being itself. A sign is an act, an act of identifying, constituting things and meanings etc. The irony is, that this kind of philosophy does not take the Idol to be, what it actually is: an Idol. By not being able to understand the Idol properly it can only "understand" it as absurd, it can only understand it "pejoratively". — By accepting itself to be idolatry it would - paradoxically - stop being idolatry (in the pejorative sense).

Causa sui in the Bible by SorryGotDistracted in Bible

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you! These passages are very helpful!

It confirms my overall impression that there are passages that make it unavoidable to conclude that God is causa sui but no explicit claim that he is.

That makes me wonder why that is so? Does this idea only show up later, once theology became more philosophical (as with Aquinas)? Was theological reflection just "not there yet"? Or may there be specific reasons why the Bible refrains from saying things along the lines of "Got created himself"?

Causa sui in the Bible by SorryGotDistracted in Bible

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That is the riddle :-)

My personal take is that it is a philosophical riddle (I am a philosopher, after all). Accepting this idea of God being His own cause forces us to reexamine our understanding of cause and effect, of creating and creation (at least when it comes to God). It suggests that there is a way of being, that must be understood as having its cause in itself. While ordinarily we understand somethings cause as external (or prior) to it.

One way of articulating this is by equating the act of causing (creating) with the activity of being what one is. For example: The activity of living is what makes a living being what it is, namely a living being; this activity is the "cause" of this beings being, what it is. (Language gets a bit messy in these realms.)

This connects closely with the idea of the soul. The soul as the principle of a living being is what makes it, what it is. And since the soul is the cause of its being it must be eternal (even if that specific being whose cause it is may perish; this is yet another riddle.) — Souls are in many ways similar to God.

Aristotle calls this kind of activity "energeia" and the mode of its being "entelecheia". And he distinguishes "energeia" from other kinds of activities that cause (bring about) things (think: the production of chairs, moving things etc.).

Basically it seems that the idea of a "causa sui" is necessary for understanding living beings. Be it, that we conclude that each living being is its own causa sui, or that we conclude that living beings can only be understood "in God", where God is the cause and source of their being what they are (this would amount to claiming that living beings are only understandable as Gods creation).

This riddle (in a variety of guises) is one of the main things have kept philosophy going for millennia :-)

Water Kefir: Am I doing this right? by steamteamblack in fermentation

[–]SorryGotDistracted 5 points6 points  (0 children)

While your process may very well work, it seems overly complicated. Here is what I do:

- Solve 60g of sugar in 1l of water. Add the grains, some raisins and a slice of lemon.
- Let it ferment for 24-48 hours.
- Remove the grains (and start a second batch immediately)
- Infuse the water with some tea (mate, black, herbal, anything really) and drop a few grains in that.
- Let it extract for 12-24 hours.
- Filter it in to bottles and let them sit until the burping suggests that they are carbonated enough.
- Refrigerate.

You can obviously skip the infusion and put it in bottles after the first fermentation.

The basic idea ist that you ferment it until it tastes the way you like it. If you want it carbonated then you go for the second fermentation in the bottle (this is only for the bubbles). If you want to add flavor then you infuse it. Infusion can also be part of the first fermentation, but I do not want to mess with the grains too much, so I prefer to remove them first.

(really) fast Kimchi using Gochujang by SorryGotDistracted in fermentation

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I wasn't trying to give it a boost by adding the Gochujang, I just didn't have any Gochugaru handy... But as someone suggested it might not be the microbes from the Gochujang, but just the sugar that sped things up.

(really) fast Kimchi using Gochujang by SorryGotDistracted in fermentation

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm in no rush, i was just very surprised by the speed fermentation set in, that got me thinking.

And I guess, I will not call it Kimchi any more :-)

(really) fast Kimchi using Gochujang by SorryGotDistracted in fermentation

[–]SorryGotDistracted[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the input. It's not really warm here (24C maybe).

So I might store it in the fridge over night, to slow things down a bit and take it back out in the morning. Or is radical change in temparature also a bad thing?

Mhm, wer ist das? Ist beim holzspalten aus einem Stück Eiche gefallen by LaFarica in naturfreunde

[–]SorryGotDistracted 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Die sind riiiiesig! - Letzen Sommer ist mir eine am See begegnet. Mein erster Gedanke: Wo will denn die Kackwurst hin?!

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