Religion and Dinosaurs, Mathematicians and God
Submitted by Taran on Tue, 12/26/2006 - 02:03
I love checking out Wikidumper. You find gems like this:
...Some Jews and Christians believe that dinosaurs appear in the Old Testament, and regard this as evidence that the animals were still alive during early human history. As it is a modern coinage derived from Greek, the Bible does not use the word "dinosaur", but the Hebrew word tanniyn may be interpreted as referring to them[citation needed]. In English translations, tanniyn may be translated as “sea monster” or “serpent”, but it is usually translated as “dragon”. These creatures are mentioned nearly thirty times in the Old Testament and are found both on land and in the water. At another point, the Bible describes a huge creature called a "behemoth" (Job 40:15-24) whose "tail sways like a cedar"; the behemoth is described as ranking "first among the works of God" and as impossible to capture (vs. 24). Some Biblical scholars identify the behemoth as either an elephant or a hippopotamus, but these animals have very thin tails that are not comparable to a cedar tree. Creationists therefore identify the behemoth with dinosaurs like Brachiosaurus and Diplodocus, and most commonly the Apatosaurus which has a huge, cedar-like tail. Critics point out that the tail is described as swaying like a cedar, not being as large as a cedar...
Courtesy an article being deleted in a Wikipedia near you. Also - Mathematicians and God:
...A number of famous mathematicians have made comments about mathematics and various notions of God. These mathematicians span different religions and conceptions of deity, including none at all.
Many mathematicians have expressed the view that God is in some way responsible for the rational order described so successfully by mathematics. This often involves likening God to a mathematician. The ancient Greek study of mathematics was closely related to that of religion. Plato is quoted as saying "God ever geometrizes" and Pythagoras as saying "numbers rule the Universe". Johannes Kepler stated that "The chief aim of all investigations of the external world should be to discover the rational order and harmony which has been imposed on it by God and which He revealed to us in the language of mathematics."...
Always interesting to see what is up for deletion on the Wikipedia.
If you burn books that were never printed, can someone read them?
Caretakers of the Ancient World?
I read somewhere, eons ago, that there were serpents and dragons mentioned in the Bible, and that these were early creations to keep the earth in some sort of check. With all the vegetation and fishes and such that needed some sort of control, this was a solution that makes a certain amount of sense. We have records of these huge creatures from the earliest of humankind because they were still around when man appeared. As man populated and planted areas, the dragons and sea monsters moved on. Eventually they were extinct, with or without the aid of The Great Flood.
This, of course, puts a whole new slant on extinction. If a species no longer serves a "purpose" - should we really try to "save" it?
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