>From: Greg Billock <billgr@cco.caltech.edu>
>Subject: Re: Glenn wrote: a clarification
>To: grmorton@waymark.net (Glenn R. Morton)
>Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 11:17:37 -0700 (PDT)
>X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL22]
>
>Glenn,
>
>> >
>>
>> So God is mythical?
>
>No, he's a 6002-year-old bearded White guy who sits on an uncomfortable
>blue chair atop Mt. Sinai. Nobody visits him much anymore. :-(
>
>>Why believe anything about Christianity, or any other
>> religion?
>
>Why not just believe in thermodynamics? At least we can test that
>ourselves beyond all reasonable doubt. :-)
>
>For me, I think religions are trying to do something quite different
>than mount scientifically-minded programs of inquiry into the past.
>
>> >This is probably getting
>> >a bit off-topic, though....perhaps we should continue off-screen.
>>
>> Actually, I would prefer to continue on list for one reason. The
>> young-earthers here need to know that I do hold to a similar view of
>> historicity as they do. they don't always believe this.
>
>That's true, and a good point.
>
>> [list of things not to be literalized snipped.]
>>
>> Greg, looking at the list, I wonder why one would want to study or believe
>> a book that was so wrong about what it said, other than as a historical
>> curiosity. Surely a book which is so erroneous historically can have no
>> claim on my life or anyone else's either.
>
>That the only thing with any power to compel or provide guidance is a kind
>of denatured ideological list of historical truths?! In my experience,
>this isn't what I find to have the most spiritual significance at all.
>Certainly what has happened is important, and has spiritual ramifications,
>but (for me anyway) what is happening *now* seems much more significant.
>
>> >Of course, this doesn't mean mythology has no historical basis. (The
>> >case of Mt. Mazama in the Northwest is a good example.) I take it
>> >to mean, though, that the message of the story is primarily mythological,
>> >or theological, and not primarily historical.
>>
>> That is fine but who creates the mythology, God or man? If it is man made,
>> what possible relevance should it have for me if it is merely man made
>> myth? Should I change my behavior for man made myth?
>
>Why should I change my behavior because this set of historical facts is
>true and not that one? Out of fear of punishment?
>
>Advertisers have learned that the way to make people change their
>behaviors reliably is *not* by setting out dry arguments about the Civil
>War, or whatever, but by setting up associations, experiences, and the
>like. While I don't think much of advertising generally, I am persuaded
>that advertisers know more about the basics of human motivations and
>behaviors than pretty much anybody else, and the strategies they use,
>even when I think they are wrong, betray a reality about the way people
>are.
>
>Spiritually, this can perhaps be boiled down to a simple statement which
>Jesus knew well and applied consistently:
>
> People respond to stories.
>
>So he told them stories; he didn't drag out a chalkboard and start drawing
>geophysical diagrams about Pleistocene biogeography and its implications
>for modern radiations. That's what mythology is: stories. Stories tuned
>to evoke spiritual responses, and to inculcate spiritual awareness and
>attitudes. Now I am sure we agree that history is a story, or can be
>told that way, as can other scientific ideas. What I'm saying, though,
>is that what is paramount is the *story*. A story or mythology can have
>bad aims of course (building a myth of smoking as a romantic pursuit of
>steely-eyed, tough cowboys, for instance, or ultra-hip party animals, which
>gets children addicted), so I do not think the suggestion that stories
>with no factual basis have no persuasive power, and cannot be judged on
>their effects, is born out in fact.
>
>-Greg
>
>
>
glenn
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
Foundation, Fall and Flood
& lots of creation/evolution information
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm