Re: Observe the trend

On Sat, 15 Mar 2025 19:12:11 +0000, DB Cates wrote:

On 2025-03-15 11:36 a.m., Bob Casanova wrote:

On Sat, 15 Mar 2025 21:42:19 +1100, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by MarkE <me22over7@gmail.com>:
>
Never mind; I see you corrected your error in a later post.
Thanks for doing so.
>

On 15/03/2025 4:49 pm, Bob Casanova wrote:

On Fri, 14 Mar 2025 09:19:20 -0700, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by Bob Casanova <nospam@buzz.off>:
>

On Fri, 14 Mar 2025 20:13:29 +1100, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by MarkE <me22over7@gmail.com>:
>
<snip>

>
The measure of literalism is in the *interpretation* of the text of
Genesis, not the quoting of it.
>

Nope; sorry. "Literalism" literally (sorry 'bout that) means
that the text is taken exactly as read; no interpretation
allowed. If it's interpreted it's not taken literally.

>

No comment? OK.

>

>
You've misunderstood. The context was Martin inferring I was a
literalist because I quoted Genesis.
>

In this particular case, context is irrelevant; you made a
declarative statement regarding the measure of literalism.
That statement was incorrect; literalism allows NO
interpretation. Stop trying to wiggle out; your were wrong.
Admit it and move on.

>

I'm a bit of two minds about this. The usual complaint about the misuse
of "literal(ly)" is associated with a counter-factual. ie "I literally
died when he said that." Clearly NOT literal. In other cases there is
clear room  for interpretation. Language is not unambiguous. Take the
statement "God exists". What is the literal meaning? It is not clearly
counter-factual (even though I believe it is not true for many/most
interpretations of 'God') It surely depends on how both 'God" and
"exists" are defined and so interpretation is required.

Indeed.
What is implied by asserting that god 'spoke into existence'
or 'spoke into being'?  It's an odd turn of phrase that clearly
is a call back to Genesis. As such it is heavily loaded with
connotations with a lingering possibility of _Biblical_Literalism_
in the sense of people who thinks this must mean that there was
some vocalization involved. There are those who treat this in
ways which, if it didn't specifically involve religious beliefs,
would be symptomatic of psychosis. (biting our tongues)
But it's just a connotation and not a rock solid invocation of
these caricature biblical literalists. Attempting to be semi-poetical,
I'd say it's in the camp of 'take a cautious half-step backwards'
rather than 'run away, run away'.
This wraps back into the suite of accusations about St. Augustine's
warning regards imposing scriptural interpretations over readily
observable science. The violation certainly looks to be there
in spirit. Certain people's interpretation of scripture sure seems
to be directing the way they interpret evidence from the world.
They've gone far enough to be giving their style of christianity
a black eye. But I haven't seen the knock-out punch, just multiple
attempts to damage the other guys hands with his face.