<HTML>Sebkhet wrote:
>
> Anthony the fact that you can climb onto a fence and
> crow over some one doesn't make your view point any more
> useful or compelling.
No, what makes a viewpoint more useful or compelling is evidence. I'm asking for it, and not getting any.
By virtue of my first statement, this makes Makheru's viewpoint useless and uncompelling. Thanks for helping clarify that point.
What it says to me is- Anthony is one
> who judges all knowledge and nothing gets by him!
I don't "judge" anything. I simply examine evidence, logic and methodology. Anybody can do it... it's called "critical thinking", and you don't have to be an ordained priest, minister, cult leader, professor, doctor or card-carrying member of CSICOP to do it. Makheru can do it...but appears to be unwilling.
> But on this
> latest little warp of yours I feel your slivers - you fell
> off the fence and broke off the pickets you were standing on.
You're imagining things. I asked for evidence to show the AE's fit the description Makheru asserted in his first post. Makheru provided no such evidence, but continuously tried to change the subject to his personal beliefs. I really don't care about his beliefs. I care about ancient Egyptians. It appears there is a huge difference between the two.
> If you were actually interested in learning anything or even
> helping anyone else to learn wouldn't you have tried a little
> harder to help Makheru recover the evidence of what you seek?
I asked several times. The fact that Makheru has dodged the question, and obfuscated with his own personal beliefs, is most certainly not MY fault. But... I'm not surprised that you would try to pin the blame for HIS choice of actions on me. It's either that, or deal with the FACT that the mistake is all his.
People are responsible for their own actions. Period.
> Or are you truly unaware of evidence that the Egyptians were
> well familiarized with their environs and the biological
> processes characteristic of such?
I asked for evidence of this assertion. You are now making it. Please provide your evidence. Thank you.
Are you familiar with the
> domestication, refinement and cultivation of plants and
> animals?
Very much so. Do you have evidence that this occurred, and is this evidence that supports Makheru's initial claim? The claim was:
>
> The people (ancient Egyptians) developed a highly intergrated
> understanding of their enviornment and universe around them
Can you explain how keeping goats gives one a highly integrated understanding of one's environment and universe around oneself?
This should be good. I know lots of farmers who seem to do just fine without "sacred geometry" ever entering their minds.
> Are you familiar with the manner in which figs are
> pollinated? How would one pollinate a fig when the insects
> native to the fig's native lands are absent? Weren't there
> figs dating back to the second dynasty or earlier?
And this relates to "integrated knowledge of the universe" in what way?
And when did they start this fig pollination, anyway? Can you supply some dates and references that prove it was an Egyptian invention, and not an import from Babylonia, Mesopotamia, or some other country that invented it first?
Even if they did develop it first, can you please tell me how it is not a product of simple observational science and trial and error application? The ancient Egyptians were a practical people. This wasn't something that needed to come from the priesthood. In fact, I'll wager they argued with it when the mud-digging farmer first brought it to their attention. "Who are you to think you can do the Aten's work???" They probably threatened to burn him or something.
>
> Regardless-Akhenaten published his treatise on the
> interdependence of nature's attributes
> and he wrote it for people to comprehend long after his death.
Ah, finally. Evidence that can be examined!
But first... who translated this? What are the translator's affiliations and qualifications? I ask because we must remember what Joseph Davidovits did with an offering list from a stela... he "translated" it as a list of chemicals needed to make geopolymers. It's easy to change words to fit a preconceived conclusion, and I want to make sure that isn't happening here.
>
> II) WORKS & NATURE OF THE ATEN
>
> the child
>
> 33 O You, who make semen grow in women,
> 34 who creates people from sperm,
> 35 who feeds the son in his mother's womb,
> 36 who soothes him to still his tears.
> 37 You nurse in the womb !
> 38 Giver of breath to nourish all creatures.
> 39 When the child emerges from the womb
> to breathe on the day of his birth,
> You open wide his mouth to supply his needs.
Childbirth has nothing to do with deities "breathing life" into the children. So far, you're only showing that the Egyptians were being force-fed religious dogma, not enlightenment.
>
> the chicken
>
> 40 The chick in the egg, chirping in the shell,
> 41 You give it breath within to sustain its life.
> 42 When it is complete, it breaks out from the egg.
> 43 It emerges from the egg, to say it is complete.
> 44 Walking on its legs when emerging.
A mystical deity provides oxygen to pre-hatched chicks? Is that a fact?
>
>
> 45 How many are Your deeds,
> 46 though hidden from sight.
> 47 O sole god without equal !
> 48 You made the earth as You desired, You alone .
> 49 With people, cattle, and all creatures.
> 50 With everything upon earth that walks on legs,
> 51 and all that is on high and flies with its wings.
"Intelligent Design", or "Creationism" have been debunked for a long, long time. You're trying to claim these people had an integrated awareness of their universe...yet they had these basic facts clearly wrong. How great can their understanding be? All they did was make the same mistake other cultures have made... they didn't get it right, either. That doesn't prove advancement, Sebkhet. It proves just the opposite, in fact.
>
>
> 52 The foreign lands of Syria and Nubia, and the land of Egypt,
> 53 You set everybody in his place and supply their needs.
> 54 They all have their food and their lifetimes are counted.
> 55 Tongues differ in speech, their characters as well.
> 56 Their skins are distinct, for You distinguished the peoples.
You might wish to confer with a molecular biologist or geneticist on this one, but I'm pretty sure that Syrians, Nubians and Egyptians weren't "created" or "set in place". They migrated there from various parts of the world. No cult deity required. Just humans, looking for food.
If this is your evidence, you sure aren't fairing very well.
>
> 57 You made the Nile in the netherworld.
> 58 You bring it up when You will,
> to keep those of Egypt alive,
> for You have created them for Yourself.
Gee...one would think that a culture that had an integrated and complete understanding of its universe would realize that it isn't a deity that makes the river rise, but the rain in the mountains to the south.
Once again.. it is showing that they were disconnected from reality... not intimately aware of it.
>
> 59 Lord of All who toils for them.
> 60 Lord of All Lands who shines for them.
> 61 O Aten of daytime, great in glory !
>
> 62 All distant lands, You make them live.
> 63 You made a heavenly Nile descend for them.
> 64 With waves beating on the mountains like the sea,
> to drench their fields and their towns.
Yeah... umm... that's called rain, and it's created by evaporation and humidity differentials in the atmosphere. Once again, these people took a belief-driven shortcut, and never bothered looking to see if they were right or wrong about their conclusions.
They were wrong.
>
> 65 How excellent are your ways, O Lord of Eternity !
Not evident at all, I'm afraid. These people had over 15 centuries at this point in their history, and they hadn't advanced one whit toward a better understanding of how things really worked... if I am to accept your evidence as an indication of their highest intellectual achievement.
> 66 The Nile from heaven for foreign peoples
> and all land-creatures that walk on legs.
> 67 For Egypt the Nile from the netherworld.
>
>
> 68 Your rays nurse all fields.
> 69 When You shine they live, they grow for You.
Well, if we're talking about the sun, then they have a rudimentary, crude understanding of sunlight=plantgrowth. However, I don't see any evidence that they discovered how chlorophyl and photosynthesis work... do you?
> 70 You made the seasons,
> so that all that You made may come to life.
> 71 Winter cools them, and heat makes them sense You.
Actually, it's the obliquity of the earth's axis that makes the seasons. The sun is exactly the same throughout the year.
What was it you were trying to prove again? How much they knew? Or how little....
>
>
> 72 You created the sky far away in order to ascend to it,
> to witness everything You created.
See previous notes on Creationism.
> 73 You are alone, shining in Your form of the living Aten.
Another great cosmological error. There are billions and billions of suns in the universe. So much for being alone...
> 74 Risen, radiant, distant and near.
"distant and near"... .there's one way of making sure you don't get the answer wrong! You don't happen to have any references to the Aten being an average of 286 billion cubits away, do you? That would help....
> 75 You made millions of forms from Yourself alone :
> cities, towns, fields, the river's course.
Again... see previous notes on debunked Creationism.
And I'm sure the men and women who built the cities, town and cleared and plowed the fields would love to know that they were gods. Do you think anybody told them before they died?
> 76 All eyes see You above them
> as the Aten of the daytime on high.
>
Well, I think I'm living proof that THIS one is completely wrong.
And by the way... are you aware that Atenism was completely dead and forgotten before hieroglyphs were translated by Champollion in 1817? Not quite the self-evident "knowledge" people think it is, was it....
>
> 80 The ones on earth come into being by Your hand,
> in the way You made them.
I guess I count as his worst foul-up then, huh....
> 81 When You rise, they live.
> 82 When You set, they die.
The Aten "set" for 1500 years before hieroglyphs were re-translated by the French. Humanity still flourished. Oops.
> 83 You Yourself are lifetime itself,
> one lives through You.
Just skip those 1500 years. Oh...and the hundreds of thousands of years <i>before</I> Atenism was conjured up from the imagination. That leaves a total of about 1800 years in which Atenism was actually known to exist. What about the rest of history? Did nobody live from 400 CE to 1816?
Funny...I can think of huge nations and empires that came into being in that time... So much for only living through him, huh?
> 84 All eyes rest on beauty until You set.
> 85 All labor ceases when You rest in the west.
Tell that to the people working the nightshift at Microsoft customer service, or 7-11, or Ford. They'll be happy to know they're getting paid for nothing.
Sorry, Sebkhet. You've only shown that the writer of this document was detached from nature, and had no real understanding of the universe around him.
If you wish to assert that the ancient Egyptians knew more than this, you'll have to produce the evidence of same.
Anthony</HTML>