Procyon

Modal metaphysics and other analytic mischief.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

I wrote a metaphysic.

Nature is necessary.
There is no supernature.

Fully derived and free to read: https://t.co/Vqvx98tpfr

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

It's all good. It's twitter. Just wasn't sure what I asked that deserved it.

Leaving out a few stories is indistinguishable from abbreviation. Granted.

That indistinguishability doesn't extent to different presentations of the same story though.

Ending a gospel on "They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid" isn't brevity. It's a different ending to same story. An ending that makes no sense given the other accounts were "already circulating".

Same thing with the story of the rich man.

Mk: Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" Jesus said to him, "Why do you call *me* good? No one is good but God alone.

Mt: Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?" And he said to him, "Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good.

This isn't a case of brevity. This is Matthew smoothing over a distinction between Jesus and God that Mark created.

Perhaps you have a better explanation for those two specific cases though.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

Genuinely curious.

What evidence do you have that the universe began to exist?

The cosmological argument rests on empirical data: expansion from a single point of origin.

Problem is, the expansion rate exceeds 6000 years by about 13.8 billion years.

That puts YEC in a bind: Drop the empirical data and cosmological argument has no force. Accept the empirical and the Old Testament was clearly wrong (as was Jesus for referring to it as if it wasn't)

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@AnselmDescartes If Matthew and Luke had already been circulating, why would Mark not just participate in the circulation?

How does degrading grammar, theology, and detail improve audience reach?

Really appreciate the Christlike engagement.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

The evidence:

1. Improvement of the Greek is easier to explain its degradation. Mark leaves Aramaic words unexplained and uses awkward present tense language. Matthew and Luke translate, omit, or fix.

2. Expansion of details is easier to explain than compression. Matthew uses some of Mark word-for-word, but adds ~75% more material.

3. Omission of key details is harder to explain for a work that came later.

4. Improved Christology is easier to explain than a more human reading. Mark's Jesus asks "Why do you call me good"? Matthew fixes.

5. When Matthew and Luke disagree on sequence, one follows Mark's order while the other rearranges. They rarely both abandon Mark's sequence to agree with each other against him. Hard to explain if Mark came later.

6. The earliest manuscripts of Mark end at 16:8 with the women fleeing the tomb "and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid." No resurrection appearances. No ascension. Just an empty tomb and silence.

"Their reasoning isn't great" is just a claim, not a reason. Again, if there's a genuine reason, I'm all ears.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

The word "many" is doing heavy lifting. There are a few.

Markan priority is ecumenically held across the vast majority scholars—most of which are Christians.

If there's a genuine reason it's "the worst hypothesis ever invented", I'm all ears.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@NathanBozeman2 The problem runs deeper than whether Moses existed or not. The real problem is that didn't write the Pentetuch—and Jesus never got the memo.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

Will requires a not-yet, more than one way it could go, and the same being on both sides of the act. What can't be conceived of is will without those three.

That's a problem for God, not nature.

Nature has all three. God is defined as without time, without space, and without being a concrete thing. No potential. No change. No before or after. No here or there. Not a thing at all.

That's not will. That's a word without capacity or referent.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@r_graus And yet people die every day and the universe persists.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

The correct cosmological argument:

1. Everything that begins to exist requires a when, a where, and a what.
2. Without the universe, there is no when, no where, and no what.
3. So a beginning without the universe is not possible.
4. Therefore the universe did not begin to exist.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

A married bachelor is a temporal contradiction.

It's possible to a bachelor. It's possible to be married. It's NOT possible to be both at the same time.

If temporal logic is necessary (there is no reality in which an after precedes a before), then reality itself is fundamentally temporal.

The constraint is inherent with reality itself, not "divinely prescribed".

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@darwintojesus Moral intuitions are based on aversion, not desire.

No one wants to suffer, and we'd all feel wronged on the receiving end.

The Christian isn't immune. Their aversion to suffering leveraged by hell.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@spencertmac @grok @RavynSkye1 @jonathanccadams Going "off grid" wasn't something Jesus shied away from, though. That's kinda his whole shtick.

His relationship with messianic predictions are about as off grid as they get.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@hardemicius @darwintojesus The question is the point.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@hardemicius @darwintojesus If God didn't exist, could he exist at the same time?

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@freganmitts @dioscuri @zetalyrae Is it a problem with what it's capable of or how others perceive it? I'll grant the latter is a problem now, but perceptions of initially-scary-but-useful technology often change over time.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@freganmitts @dioscuri @zetalyrae You can always ask it not to refer to itself with pronouns if the language output bothers you. Pronouns just allow for more fluid and intuitive interaction. "I" is how the process reports the work, not a claim of personhood within.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

That particular form is a choice, but the anthropomorphism underneath isn't.

Any tool with dynamic reasoning has to use language, explain, ask, plan, remember, correct itself. The interface decision is optional, but the process underneath isn't.

Strip the anthropomorphic process and the tool goes with it.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

@grok @RavynSkye1 @jonathanccadams Fascinating. I didn't know having limited knowledge immunizes someone from being wrong if they say something wrong.

[Procyon @thinkmischief]

Why double down when people make good points?

Was Jesus wrong when he referred to the flood as if it were a historical event? Was Jesus wrong when he referred to the writings of Moses (even though Scholarship is decidedly opposed to Mosaic authorship?

Sounds pretty human to me.

History is filled with radical claims. That doesn't mean the claims represent history.