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The Risk of Discovery

paulgraham.com

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Re: The Risk of Discovery

#301

Post by olavk »

_urga wrote: post #291
olavk wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paul predicted the end the world to arrive in his lifetime. He was wrong. See: 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17

No, Paul is addressing the church, then and now. His use of the word "we" in the passage you quote has that sense. It's characteristic of Paul, see Ephesians 2 for another example. To come back to your point, if you read the rest of Paul's letter to the Thessalonians, you will find Paul's position (which is in fact Jesus' position) on the matter: "Now, brothers and sisters, about times and dates we do not need to wri…

> You can't slip a piece of paper between Paul and Jesus. Jesus himself authenticates Paul as one of his apostles.

What does this even mean? Jesus never mentioned Paul, and Jesus and Paul never even met.

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#302

Post by _urga »

olavk wrote: post #296
_urga wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The prophecy in Isiah 53 talks about a guy who was incredibly ugly and despised by everyone, who was killed disgracefully, and who never uttered a word." You reduce the passage to being about "a guy who was incredibly ugly" whereas the context (see Isaiah 52) indicates someone beaten horrifically, "his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being and his form marred beyond human likeness". Your carica…

All the parts about atonement for our sins is theological constructions to make Jesus match the prophecy. Why do we know Jesus died for our sins? Because the prophecy said so! How do we know the prophecy describes Jesus? Because Jesus died for our sins! And so on. It is a giant circular argument. If we extract the "factual" statements about the figure in the prophecy, you will see it does not match what we know about…

"All the parts about atonement for our sins is theological constructions to make Jesus match the prophecy."

No, I was just quoting from Isaiah there. That's Isaiah speaking many years before Jesus, describing and requiring the Christ to be a Suffering Servant.

Not many ancient historians would contest that Jesus was a historical person, or have any reason to question that he died the way he did. Nor would they contest the public life of John the Baptist or Pilate or Herod for that matter, or that the New Testament documents contain eye witness testimony, as well as incidental historical detail in the form of taken-for-granted shared understanding of historical events in the minds of those who were then alive and able to contest and examine the facts. Many of those who witnessed to Jesus suffered for their convictions, and faced tremendous pressure and incentive to quit.

"And you have to ignore or gloss over the parts that does not fit: 'He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth.'"

Have you read the remarkable account of Jesus before Pilate?

At the end of the day, you must decide for yourself.

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#303

Post by _urga »

olavk wrote: post #301
_urga wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, Paul is addressing the church, then and now. His use of the word "we" in the passage you quote has that sense. It's characteristic of Paul, see Ephesians 2 for another example. To come back to your point, if you read the rest of Paul's letter to the Thessalonians, you will find Paul's position (which is in fact Jesus' position) on the matter: "Now, brothers and sisters, about times and dates we do not need to wri…

> You can't slip a piece of paper between Paul and Jesus. Jesus himself authenticates Paul as one of his apostles. What does this even mean? Jesus never mentioned Paul, and Jesus and Paul never even met.

"Jesus never mentioned Paul"

According to Luke, in Acts 9:15 he did:

"But the Lord said to him [Ananias], “Go, for he [Paul] is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel."

Apart from that, Peter also understood that Paul had been authenticated by Jesus as his apostle, see 2 Peter 3:

"Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction."

Being an apostle meant that Paul was expressly authorized and enabled to represent the Lord. Hence the saying, "you can't slip a piece of paper..." meaning that one can't try and play one off against the other, as if they hold opposing views. Paul represents Jesus, nothing more, nothing less. Paul is merely a servant, the words are those of Jesus.

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#304

Post by bbctol »

cutler wrote: post #257
nitrogen wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scientists can become very selective when dealing with alternatives to their world view. No, they just remember people for their contributions rather than their mistakes.

What scientists cannot accept is that there are aspects of human life which are not observable or measurable. Science is good at measuring what is observable but many scientists then make that a foundation for denying, ridiculing or reducing what is not observable. Science then becomes, paradoxically, a religion.

Science, by definition, makes no statements on way or another about what is unobservable. Some scientists may ridicule the concept, other scientists may revere that which they believe in, but science does not make claims about that entire field, and it wouldn't be improved if it did.

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#305

Post by [deleted] »

cutler wrote: post #257
nitrogen wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scientists can become very selective when dealing with alternatives to their world view. No, they just remember people for their contributions rather than their mistakes.

What scientists cannot accept is that there are aspects of human life which are not observable or measurable. Science is good at measuring what is observable but many scientists then make that a foundation for denying, ridiculing or reducing what is not observable. Science then becomes, paradoxically, a religion.

[deleted]

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#306

Post by bbctol »

whack wrote: post #110
oskarth wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for reading and commenting with good faith and a, as far as I can tell, correct historical frame in mind. As opposed to with some literalist naive and/or hostile, contemporary-navel-gazing nonsense that is completely missing the point of the essay. For more thinking in a similar direction, see Nassim Taleb's excerpt on the Lindy effect ( https://medium.com/incerto/an-expert-called-lindy-fdb30f146e... ), whe…

" If you hear advice from a grandmother or elders, odds are that it works at ninety percent. On the other hand, in part because of scientism and academic prostitution, in part because the world is hard, if you read anything by psychologists and behavioral scientists, odds are it works at less than ten percent " Some of my favorite books of all time were Taleb's, but I have to say, his writing is the perfect demonstra…

I tell people to "read enough Taleb that you understand why you shouldn't always listen to Taleb"

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#307

Post by state_less »

jacobush wrote: post #293
state_less wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is also important to recognize that Newtons time had come. Newton doesn't make those discoveries 1000 years before or after. Our thoughts are placed in time, just as much as this message is in response to the timing of the authors post. In addition, It's not too infrequent that you'll find another scientist who wrote about the same thing 30 years earlier, or in Newton's case with Leibniz, concurrent. Rarely do we…

Our species?

Yep, it's a reference to homosapiens. We have been talking to each other for a while now, spreading our knowledge. It's the stories we pass on, logic, math, physics and medicine that predicated inhabiting nearly everywhere and becoming so many. We are on a higher-order mutation now, many thoughts live and die in a generation. The advantageous ones stick around (eg. Newton's). We pass them on from generation to generation. Now we are more connected, and it's moving faster. Stay cool and and enjoy the ride cousin.

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#308

Post by jamesrcole »

nocman wrote: post #143

"Physics seems to us a promising thing to work on, and alchemy and theology obvious wastes of time." I'm not sure which "us" pg is referring to, but the essay gives me the impression that he meant something like "most people" (I could be reading him wrong, but that was my impression). Alchemy is obviously a waste of time -- I won't dispute that, and I suspect that "most people" would agree with that assertion. Being…

> "Physics seems to us a promising thing to work on, and alchemy and theology obvious wastes of time." I'm not sure which "us" pg is referring to, but the essay gives me the impression that he meant something like "most people" (I could be reading him wrong, but that was my impression).

I think "us" refers to the readers. Ie the kind of person likely to be reading an essay of his

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#309

Post by olavk »

_urga wrote: post #302
olavk wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All the parts about atonement for our sins is theological constructions to make Jesus match the prophecy. Why do we know Jesus died for our sins? Because the prophecy said so! How do we know the prophecy describes Jesus? Because Jesus died for our sins! And so on. It is a giant circular argument. If we extract the "factual" statements about the figure in the prophecy, you will see it does not match what we know about…

"All the parts about atonement for our sins is theological constructions to make Jesus match the prophecy." No, I was just quoting from Isaiah there. That's Isaiah speaking many years before Jesus, describing and requiring the Christ to be a Suffering Servant. Not many ancient historians would contest that Jesus was a historical person, or have any reason to question that he died the way he did. Nor would they contes…

I think you misunderstood my point about circular reasoning, or maybe I was not clear. I know you quoted Isiah. I am disputing the quote matches Jesus very well, except for the theological justifications which was concocted up after the fact to make Jesus match the prophecy.

You are correct most historians assume a historical Jesus did exist. Just as they assume Mohammad and Gautama Buddha existed.

Re: The Risk of Discovery

#310

Post by WhitneyLand »

nocman wrote: post #267
WhitneyLand wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It being popular you say, implies it's good? Wouldn't you have to instead weigh the good results vs. the bad results to know the net value to society?

"It being popular you say, implies it's good?" ^ I never said "popularity of belief" in any way implies the correctness of belief. I could find and list many popular beliefs that I am certain are blatantly false. I merely pointed out that the essay seems (to me) to imply that "most people" in the world discount the study of theology as "crazy" and "a waste of time". The reference to the popularity of the Bible ( as "…

I see your point, but in talking about Newton the context is science. In science anything that is not falsifiable is not useful, so in this sense is it not a fair appraisal?

If the context is useful tools for those that practice religion, then I agree most would not consider theology a waste of time.

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