Multidisciplinary Philosophy Saves the Day: Genesis 1 and 2 And the Bible: He Doesn´t Think They Fit Scientific Reality; Neither Do I

greenpeaceRdale1844coop • 2 years ago I don´t see any reference to Thomas Berry´s work. Scholarship, scholarship. And referring to the "!iteralist" version as "nonsense" is also something I wouldn´t recommend. The epistemologies of Psychology, Sociology, and Anthropology combine with History and Philosophy to remind us that Science itself is actually Scientific Philosophy, not "the Truth." Even more specifically, modern Scientific Philosophy is only possible because of minimum standards of human conduct that have only developed around a core of Christian understandings and social capital forms. That includes the perception of the Sacred. Not just "Big dangs!" but the Biggest dang of all, Creeping Unsustainability, to use a Metallica song reference. The literalists unwillingness to modernize and expand their understanding is nonsense at its worst. It is desperation in the face of the abuse of economic power by another group of hypocritical apostates in Corporate Executive profiteering boardrooms and their US-led opportunistic exploitative business model. I didn´t invent the Social Gospel, but I know how much it is ignored. Whether we talk about George Fox´s illuminated founding of the Quaker Friends and their pivotal Social Gospel work, or the problem of secular alienation and extremist ideology, there are ample nuances to be made to avoid throwing babies out with the bathwater, and to nurture that baby to health, somewhere between Al Gore, Michael Moore, Matthew Fox, Rev William Barber, Louise Hay, and Francis Moore Lappe. •

Avatar KraigDeKompressorKruncha greenpeaceRdale1844coop • 5 hours ago Interesting; not all of it is new, but your passion for the subject shines through. In summary you're saying that the text of Genesis 1 is a poetic reflection of a scientific reality. The most obvious question it literally begs is why is there a need to synthesise the two? The second question that is unanswered is, if science squares with Genesis 1, then what about the second creation narrative in Genesis 2 (which most of us will argue is the older story) and is not dealt with. The problem then is why does one myth square with science but the other can't be hammered into a scientific model? I also think that there is a hermeneutical issue: if text follows science, how do we apply this interpretive methodology to other texts within the the same "Scripture"? The weakness of your thesis is that it does not account for two creation stories. Also, it can't be scaled as a general hermeneutic to apply to the entire Old Testament, but only applies to one specific pericope. And thirdly, the thesis cannot account for why this specific pericope should synthesise with a scientific framework when the next chapter (and other parts of the text) doesn't or can't. Interesting it may be, however, I don't find the attempt at synthesis very helpful or convincing at all, over against other hermeneutical methodologies, like using genres - or the work of John Walton, or indeed, the allegorical styles, that deals with the text as literature. Then, once, one moves on to the next chapter the same scientific vs text issues still arise because your thesis does not resolve them. Thank you. 1 •

− Avatar greenpeaceRdale1844coop KraigDeKompressorKruncha • 6 minutes ago • edited Always glad to engage with a thoughtful, and even scholarly, commenter.. I am finding that my approach is in fact drawing on little used resources, and then a little bit deeper and more carefully differentiated in effect. I´m now calling it Multidisciplinary (Empirical) Philosophy, although it is multi-methodological. Let´s go. "Scientifc reality" is one component, but not at all the primary one as I reflect on the role of valuing multidisciplinary education first, addressing science´s temptations with therapeutic psychology and Comparative Religious Studies. Now, years after those insights begun in high school, I submit that modern, Christianized Philosophy is, and its use of Empiricism to supplement its methodologies. That helps understand "science" itself, being clear that scientific mentality, its knowledge domain, is a human modeling activity in a specific realm studying its sense-perceived, physical phenomena. Thus, phenomena are being identified in scientific philosophy. Scientific philosophy is a subdiscipline of philosophy, and one of a key spectrum of philosophical disciplines like the social sciences. Thus, the Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, an accomplished Harvard-Berkeley mathematician "renegade" and the Anthrax killer, a govt scientist, reveal how science tends to lead to its own terrible extremism and alienation. I recall my own feelings of anxiety at college graduation in Bio Anthro, liberal arts no less. "Reproductive fitness" was screechily occupying key mental-emotional space. I began restoring balance knocking on doors for environmental issues and more after that. Thus, science needs to be fitted into its full homebase, University-based philosophical, and multimethod empirical scholarship. Contemplative method reminds us that it is Christian-based, no less. Thomas of Aquinas took Aristotle´s abandoned and rejected First Cause argument with Christian religion and formulated its modern metaphysics. God through Jesus´ heritage, life, mission, and legacy is our transcendental metaphysical philosophical context. I would say Genesis 1 is a spiritual-poetic reflection of that multidisciplinary empirical reality. Whether Gen 1 and Gen 2 need synthesizing, or coupling, they also stand in relation to their predecessor versions in Mesopotamian society. It is Jesus whose Commandments and legacy provide our metaphysical suppositions, and the pre-Christian Bible has historical spiritual relationship in a developmental process to that. God was being perceived and experienced by pre-Christians. Scientific philosophy emerged with Christian metaphysics and society, and needs integrating to allow for the philosophical evaluation of complex Levels of Analysis and Explanation. The myths will reflect the individuals that formulated them. You´ve got the orientation in hermeneutics, but I´ve seen that the disciplinary epistemological resources used in hermeneutics ultimately pale in relation to what is available in the full scope of University-based scholarship and societal experience. I got my degree in Bio Anthro liberal arts, knocked on doors for a not for profit like Greenpeace, taught science in Africa, worked in social services casework with substance abusers and their kids, and more before getting my masters in International Relations. I drew primarily on social constructivism and constructionism, and social and ecological economics. All on top of my interfaith spiritual seeking path into interfaith Christianity. Key dynamics need to be recognized in valuing Jesus´ legacy and the role of modern philosophical forms. Pre-Christian shamanism, and the legitimacy of diverse religious practices protected under US-UN human rights, among Jesus´ greatest community legacies. FDR and Eleanor were educated in the Social Gospel, no less. I´ve reflected a bit more already on Abraham´s pivotal role. It is his spiritual-religious vision and reported experience that marks the historical differentiation away from Mesopotamian experience that has been associated with the Dilmun archeology and Ur flood sacred mythologies. Historical context determines the brutality associated with God´s own commands. Psychosocial and cultural development of biological human capacities was occuring then as now, we know thanks to Piaget and Julian Jaynes´ kinds of frameworks. The disjointedness between monarchs, the population, and prophets traces a trajectory for Jesus´ Judaic heritage that converges with the ancient Greek and Roman, splits from the Jewish, and remains intertwined.

It is that psychosocial and cultural analytical set that combines with the scientific. Identifying the era of Moses´ Exodus, and Joseph´s time, has required demystifying secular materialist anti-religious pretensions. Jungian synchronicity, and studies of meditative and prayerful meditation, along with medically attested medically impossible healing testimonies helps us note the reality of spiritual-religious experiences, perhaps giving Schleiermacher credit. That makes Moses´ visions with the transcendental-supernatural God, and the evaluation of natural-supernatural occurrences of the plagues, the Red Sea crossing, and so on, all more coherent. Multidisciplinary Empirical Philosophy (MEP). That allows for literary genre methodology you refer to, that I was hearing in Brian McLaren. MEP captures the complexity of matters, in relation to UN human rights and sustainability in Jesus´ legacy of loving integrity, through his heritage and the precious pluralism of natural human diversity. I might recommend the philosophical analysis of symbols in Charles Peirce, Ogden and Richards meaning analysis, and A Korzybski´s gen. semantics. I find them nicely organized and positioned in Eliot Chapple´s Behavioral Anthropology. I´d also recommend Fritjof Capra´s Systems Theory of Life, and his development of interrelatedness and emergentism. H Rickert´s distinctions about individualizing in the historical "sciences" is excellent, as is M Eliade´s referencing the sacred. Your concerns about reconciling the Genesis accounts is an exciting adventure in balancing the empirical, the interpretive, and the sacred. Multidisciplinary Empirical Philosophy is the appropriate terminology for the necessary and sufficient method to supersede the limits of fixating on "scientific reality." It demystifies the natural tendency to scientific materialism, or the contrary, being repulsed into simplistic Biblical literalism. Jesus´ University-based society as legacy calls for spiritual modernization, to bring out the insights that come with sustaining MEP and Levels of Analysis and Explanation in full awareness of epistemology (and perhaps epistemics), not merely "scientific reality" and its nihilistic tendencies. Christian love is what UN human rights and sustainability help us conceive most abundantly and generously, in contrast to current inequality and degradation. Pluralistic diversity, interestingly, becomes both subject to those standards and able to discipline wayward psychosocial trends by Christian hypocrites and other literalist, anti-democratic renegades. Gandhi, meanwhile, stands with Kasturbai as a fine prophetic example of Christianity´s meaning for individuals in their groups, whether in churches, meeting houses, or as Washington Gladden put it, their homes, non-Christians in Christian-based globalized and UN society, and even better, our networked communities. from https://progressivechristianity.org/resources/the-refutation-of-literalistic-creationism-with-science/#comment-5446897927