No, it's not

[Baruch]

How embarrassing will that be .. you get to Heaven, and find that the Jews (at least 144,000 Jewish martyrs) will proceed you?

[Cavebear]

A broken clock is right twice a day.  Disaster prediction is probably right once a decade.  Apocalypse prediction .. so far .. nada.

How has it been right "once a decade"?  Unless you are picking and choosing your disasters, the minor ones are completely random and The Big One hasn't happened.  Your broken clock isn't even right about THAT.

Which, though merely a jest to seem intelligent, is well known to most of us and dismissed as the argument of a simple jester.

[Baruch]

How has it been right "once a decade"?  Unless you are picking and choosing your disasters, the minor ones are completely random and The Big One hasn't happened.  Your broken clock isn't even right about THAT.

Which, though merely a jest to seem intelligent, is well known to most of us and dismissed as the argument of a simple jester.

We have global warming, we have active volcanoes (not just potential ones like Yellowstone), we have hurricanes.  They are fairly predictable, and do happen, even if we are in denial.  Of course they aren't extinction events, and are completely natural.

[Cavebear]

We have global warming, we have active volcanoes (not just potential ones like Yellowstone), we have hurricanes.  They are fairly predictable, and do happen, even if we are in denial.  Of course they aren't extinction events, and are completely natural.

It is the "predictable" that is under question...

[Baruch]

It is the "predictable" that is under question...

It is wise to not predict the future, but most are fools.  Simple physics setups where QM isn't involved, are toy problems, and those are predictable (predictably).

[Unbeliever]

How embarrassing will that be .. you get to Heaven, and find that the Jews (at least 144,000 Jewish martyrs) will proceed you?

Which would be worse, Jews or Jehovah's Witnesses?

[Baruch]

Which would be worse, Jews or Jehovah's Witnesses?

See, that is where the JW heresy went wrong.  They said that all of their people would be in the 144,000 ... though they are not Jews.  And over time, they have had more than 144,000 members ... so they are like a credit card that has become overdrawn ... and past due.

[Unbeliever]

I wonder if they know that?

[Baruch]

I wonder if they know that?

I have heard they have done the usual theological Gordian knot tying ... so that nobody gets the joke.  The taboo prevents anyone cutting the knot, until a demigod like Alexander comes along.

[Cavebear]

It is wise to not predict the future, but most are fools.  Simple physics setups where QM isn't involved, are toy problems, and those are predictable (predictably).

Since volcano eruptions and earthquakes are not very predictable, you are suggesting that events not caused by quantum mechanics are predictable.  Therefore volcanoes and earthquakes are caused by quantum mechanics?

[Baruch]

Since volcano eruptions and earthquakes are not very predictable, you are suggesting that events not caused by quantum mechanics are predictable.  Therefore volcanoes and earthquakes are caused by quantum mechanics?

QM says ... microscopic event (not macroscopic event usually) will happen X percent of the time, and the other alternatives will happen their own Y percent of the time, and the total adds to 100%.  That isn't what people mean by predictability, they were spoiled by the Newtonian model.

Macroscopic events are mostly turbulence aka classical chaos.  Chaos isn't a part of QM (I am stating a fact) ... but reductionists have to claim (not prove) that chaos and non-chaos are reducible o QM, and QM is reducible to String Theory, an String Theory is reducible to ... turtles all the way down.

[Unbeliever]

I have heard they have done the usual theological Gordian knot tying ... so that nobody gets the joke.  The taboo prevents anyone cutting the knot, until a demigod like Alexander comes along.

I thought you said that everyone is a demi-god - or is it just famous people like Alexander?

[Baruch]

I thought you said that everyone is a demi-god - or is it just famous people like Alexander?

You are the first person to take my statement as non-sarcasm, and make an intelligent question!  Are you the real Unbeliever? ;-)

I study humanity, anthropology, comparative religion thru place and time.  I get into people's head space, living or dead.  Monotheism arises from paganism, so does atheism (all secularism).  Monotheism (to atheists) is a way station on the path from many gods to no gods (full secularism).  However I don't believe in Aristotelian teleology; human life and breakdown of tradition is too great, each generation nearly starts from scratch.  I see all theism as personalism ... and monotheism as fundamentalist paganism.  Jews, Christians and Muslims are far into the fundie spectrum compared to pagans.   That doesn't mean that pagans are necessarily tolerant, they are simply more complex (see modern Sri Lanka ... Buddhist fundies).  To me, secularism is impersonalism.  A few Hindus and Buddhists are impersonalists ... but they are LARPing secularists.  Most Hindus and Buddhists are theistic.

In Greco-Roman culture, there was a continuum from simple peasant to Zeus on Olympus.  Divinity wasn't either/or, but either/and.  Since proclaiming one's divinity was a dangerous political statement, usually this was confined to prominent living people (Alexander or the Emperor Augustus) or recently living prominent people (Julius Caesar).  But this was political, that wasn't the underlying pagan thinking.  But it was articulated, by the rich and powerful, mythologically.

So Alexander's real father was Zeus (as propaganda).  Julius Caesar was descended from Venus (as propaganda).  When Emperor Augustus made his great-uncle Julius Caesar an official god, given that he was the adopted son of Julius Caesar (his heir) ... that made him the son of a god, same as Hercules or Alexander (and hence the subversive propaganda of the Christians).  Of course in old mythology, there were plenty of people who aren't historical at all, but who are descended from gods (Theseus from Poseidon).  A continuity of myth, legend, history ... aka propaganda.

As a democratic person, I see people as equal, even if they don't see it that way.  So if anyone is a demigod, then we all are.  I do assert that I am a demigod (even if I am not totally fictional or legendary, mostly history) and even if I am not rich, powerful or famous.  Therefore everyone is a demigod, including Emperor Augustus.  Now one of the titles of the Emperor, borrowed from the Cleopatra and her ancestors, who borrowed it from Alexander, is "savior".  Thus a historical Jesus (not so but ...) would be a demigod, a son of gods (Joseph and Mary) and implicitly a king (hence the objection of the authorities).  Every Jewish person is a son/daughter of gods, even every Gentile.  I can't restrict this to monarchs of Egypt or Emperors of Rome.

You see this on money.  Originally only totems were put on the design (lions for instance).  Then gods were put on the design (they were a bit totemic).  Also the Shah of Persia put himself on the coin designs (darics and sigloi).  Sometimes even a megalomanaic satrap would put his image on a coin (that was subversive).  Eventually with the Macedonians, starting with Phillip, father of Alexander ... Greeks put their face on the coins.  From there it became general ... and when the Persians freed themselves from the Greeks, they did the same universally, the Shah's face on the coin.  Originally of course the Romans didn't do this.  Initially they only put on totems, then they put on gods.  Eventually they started putting on legendary or historical ancestors.  Starting in the late Republic however, with all the civil wars, they started putting their living faces on the coins; Pompey, Caesar, Anthony, Octavian in particular.  These were all war-lords ... and understood the importance of political divinity in the East (even if this wasn't the norm in the West yet).  This continued for the rest of the Roman period.

George Washington understood all this, and having King George on English coins.  He would be horrified at the dollar bill or the quarter coin.  This idolatry of presidents started with Lincoln (in his own lifetime, there was a fractional paper note with him on it, while he was still alive, and other living people).  Washington and others were already on the stamps.  With the 100 anniversary of the birth of Lincoln, the Lincoln cent was going to be a commemorative for a single year.  But it proved so popular, it continues over 100 years later.  Pretty soon we had the Jefferson nickel, the Washington quarter, the Roosevelt dime, the Kennedy half dollar etc.  We are pretty imperial, and pretty Roman now.  The Presidential dollar commemorative series has made this fair to all the nonliving Presidents.  Living Presidents are not eligible.  So we haven't gone fully Alexander.  But I can easily foresee Trump changing that!  We will finally have an elected king in the US.  Huzzah!

[Hydra009]

Worst apocalypse ever.

[trdsf]

Worst apocalypse ever.

You know, even though I was the OP, I completely forgot about it yesterday.  But then, my asshole roommate moved out yesterday (without warning, which figures), so I was imbibing in many manhattans in celebration.  :D