Fortuna

Chili,

"Eternal time" in right brain ? "eternal light" in left brain ? Well, I studied Physics(have a BS in it) and I've never heard of either "eternal time" nor "eternal light". Can you explain these concepts ? I must have been sic kor on vacation for those lessons.

John A. Broussard

Strange or not, I think anyone claiming either of those happening should be prepared to explain how they did happen.

Do you agree?

StaticAge

LeeBuhrul said other cultures like the ones in Africa who told stories or those who wrote the bible were insane, and that it was insane to believe them in todays world.

Unless they really were insane though, whether compatible with contemporary ideas or not, there must be some reason people believe what they do. I dont think that belief in the irrational necessarilly renders someone as idiotic. There are many reasons people have for various beliefs that cannot be proven by rational explanations, like love, hope, taste in art or literature. There are things rational explanations lack ability to address in the human experience. Rationality is like a filter for certain kinds of truth, but some meaningful and valid truths are outside its grasp.

By no means am I attempting to prove such a belief is "true" or downplaying the importance of logic or rational truth. I just mean in some unexplained areas, it is quite possible for intelligent people to believe in unprovable ideas.

John A. Broussard

If you read over the above, I'm sure you'll see the contradiction. It's an easy one to make. I believe many things to be true of which I have no proof. That, of course, is no excuse for not putting those beliefs to the test of rationality whenever possible.

Had I lived in the Middle Ages, I would have believed in the four humours as the source of disease, but it wouldn't have been possible then to submit that belief to rational investigation.

Similarly, it was easy then to believe in biblical inerrancy. It is less so now, given that the evidence against it has piled up so high.

To believe, where this no evidence against the belief, is understandable. To believe in the face of evidence refuting that belief is sad.

Chili

In Psych 101 I learned that 'time-as-such' does not exist in the right brain but only in the left. They can measure that but used as proof that time does not exist when we sleep, except in the eternal mode; that patience is a virtue; that meditation removes the impulse of time, and that hypnosis (or drugs) plays a trick on our acute awareness of time.

My suggestion was that eternal light exists in our 'hind-brain' someplace from where we extract the insight to recreate the light and darkness found in our common day. Ie. sun-rays are not light until we open our eyes and then we better have a perceptive mind to intepret what we see. So we look with our eyes but see with our mind.

It never was my idea to explain the concepts eternal light and time but it is a well known biblical concept that "light was" before the sun came along to light up our day and that in the very end "light is," once again, without the sun or lamps.

Of course, we might not agree with Gen.1:1 but then why do we read Gen.1:2?

In Physics 101 they may have told you that there was just a bunch of soft nerve cells in there, that were more or less alike and were held together by fibers inside our skull. So I guess you are right, that's all there is.

badger3k

Do you mean "external" mode? Since time does not cease or stop when I am asleep, I assume that it proceeds (edit) external to myself (/edit) while I am not subjectively aware of it.
In other words, use our imagination or visualze?
Two different creation myths tied together by the biblical writers seems the most plausible explanation for the "light" before the sun. As far as I know, there wasn't a major "mystical" religious tradition (like the gnostics) among the Isrealites when those stories were written down, so I'd guess those types of explanations are after-the-fact reinterpretations.
:huh:

Chili

You mean source of health and cause for disease.

It is because we ignored this source of health that we are now curing sympoms of disease and are slowly returning to health care concerns in addition to taking care of the sick.

Chili

So you think that time is not perceived at all in the right brain?

No, just like airwaves must be transformed into sound by the mind.

But I will stop here to avoid a derail.

badger3k

Well, the physiological mechanisms are unimportant, since the subjective experience does not change the objective. Time exists whether we perceive it or not. There's a difference between philosophy and reality.

Do you believe the ancient writers of the Joshua story had a mystical tradition like the one you suggest, or is that just your interpretation (just curious)?

The key point for this thread (to me) is whether the ancient writers believed in the more mystical experience such as you propose, or else they were writing in a more mythical context (by that I mean in the style of other myths, with literal belief up in the air). To me, the Joshua story is just that, a mythical story that accentuates certain beliefs (and characters) of the culture that developed them. Any modern interpretation is irrelevant (to the original meaning) unless it adresses how the writers thought/conceived of things (such as we can't say "the sun wouldn't stop, the earth would have to" if we are considering what the writers thought - although we can phrase our responses in the more correct terminology).

Wallener

Yes, once stories are taken out of their original context, they enter an interpretive twilight zone where pretty much anything goes. Alternate explanation for the "stopped sun" is as a metaphorical shot across the bow of Sungod/Moongod cults (my G-d kicks the ass of yours). Not hard to tie that into the Exodus/Egypt part of the story, though I believe there were local Sun/Moon deities as well.

Jewish sages over the centuries have been unable to reach concensus: opinions range from Maimonides putting the story in the allegorical category to others advocating a full 48-hour day, scientific explanations be damned. If those closest to the material don't have consensus, it is unlikely to be achieved on IIDB.