Truth to Myths?

AV1611VET said:

Their wording changes with the weather.

It is no longer considered a "bang" anymore.

It is called an "expansion."

Thus it should more appropriately be called, "The Big Expansion."

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"Big Bang" was originally a mocking term created to ridicule the idea by a scientist who opposed it.

The Abominable Snowman is upset. No one posted his picture:

Andrewn said:

The Abominable Snowman is upset. No one posted his picture:

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Don't hurt his feelings, he prefers to be called The Adorable Snowman

AV1611VET said:

Who named this thing Hesperopithecus haroldcookii? the press?

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Henry Fairfield Osborn Snr.

...
And c'mon ... five years!?

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It was generally viewed with scepticism, much like the Piltdown Man fraud - "From its initial description, Hesperopithecus was regarded as an inconclusive find by a large portion of the scientific community."

Rose2020 said:

is it possible that even a myth has at least a tiny bit of scientific truth to it?

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Strictly speaking, this isn’t a scientific topic. But a good example of an ancient legend that has a degree of truth is the Iliad. We all know that the epic is attributed to the blind Greek poet Homer, and is generally believed to date from the 8th century BC. It tells the story of a war between the Pelopennesian Greeks and the city of Troy in what is now Turkey. It focuses on how the Greeks finally defeated the Trojans after a 10 year siege. Archeological evidence proves the existence of ruins of about 7 ancient cities, built one on top another in that region of Turkey. One of these showed evidence of widespread destruction by fire. So it’s certainly plausible that there really was a city of Troy, that lost a war, and was sacked and burned by a Greek army. That doesn’t mean that all the mythic elements Homer relates are true. Such as the god Apollo assisting the Trojans by shooting arrows of plague into the Greek camps. Or that Achilles was invulnerable except for his left heel. (And was finally killed when the son of the Trojan king shot him in that heel with a poisoned arrow.) But the Iliad demonstrates that ancient legends and myths may be based on real events.

AV1611VET said:

The "big bang" comes at the end, not the beginning.

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That's the big rip or the big crunch, depending. At this point the big rip looks more likely.

AV1611VET said:

It is no longer considered a "bang" anymore.

It is called an "expansion."

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I don't believe there is a contradiction.

The expansion occurred before the big bang.

Before they knew about the expansion, they postulated that it started from a singularity, but it doesn't. After the expansion ended; this is what they used to call the big bang.

Just like with Newton's laws. They are correct until you have to deal with large gravitational fields or high speeds. But this doesn't disprove science.

To my knowledge, the term big bang is still used for the beginning, though it's more a popular term than any exact description. After all, it was never actually an explosion in the usual sense. Expansion would be a more accurate term. I don't believe anyone ever thought there was literally a singularity at the beginning. The math sort of looked like that, but the singularity was understood as being physically unlikely, and an indication that at those densities and temperatures things were going on that we don't understand.

Tayla said:

The expansion occurred before the big bang.

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That's news to me.

hedrick said:

To my knowledge, the term big bang is still used for the beginning,

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And as usual, science has it backward.

The "big bang" will occur at the end of time, not the beginning.

2 Peter 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.

AV1611VET said:

That's news to me.

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I'm talking about the concept of the big bang before they knew of the expansion. Sorry I wasn't clear.

In other words, once they learned of the expansion, they put it in front of what they before knew as the big bang. Doing this did not in any way prove that science is not dependable, which is what is often claimed; that if scientists learn more as time goes on, this invalidates all of science which went before.

Tayla said:

I'm talking about the concept of the big bang before they knew of the expansion. Sorry I wasn't clear.

In other words, once they learned of the expansion, they put it in front of what they before knew as the big bang. Doing this did not in any way prove that science is not dependable, which is what is often claimed; that if scientists learn more as time goes on, this invalidates all of science which went before.

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Okay.

Thanks, Tayla, for clarifying.

Andrewn said:

The Leviathan is mentioned five times in the OT, in Job 3:8, Job 40:15–41:26, Psalm 74:14, Psalm 104:26 and Isaiah 27:1.

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The leviathan is one of three legendary monsters from ancient Jewish folklore, the other two are behemoth and ziz. Many might not be immediately famliar with the ziz, its only mention in the Bible is found a handful of times, though it is often translated into English as "wild beasts", as we read in Psalm 50:11

"I know all the birds of the mountains, and ziz siday is Mine." - Psalm 50:11

English translators seem to have generally speaking favored rendering ziz based on an ambiguous root possibly meaning "to move" or "moving thing(s)", and thus have chosen "wild beasts". Siday is translated as "of the field", from sadeh, "field" or "plain".

Given the context though, seeing as God says He owns the birds of the mountains, and also the ziz of the field, that a reference to a bird here might be in keeping with the intended meaning, rather than "wild beasts". Though it's possible a case could be argued either way.

In any event, these are the three legendary creatures that are mentioned in the Bible (depending on how one wants to treat the case of the ziz). And they likely do not necessarily correspond to any real living creatures, but are rather references to fantastical, legendary animals. The ziz, for example, in traditional Jewish/Hebrew folklore is very similar to both the Persian simurgh or the Greek phoenix.

That said, it may be that, minus the fantastical elements ascribed to these creatures, they may have originally been based on real animals. For example the behemoth has been described as perhaps having been an elephant, or at least based on the elephant, with its "tail" referring to the animal's trunk, or as some scholars think, something else altogether different, cough cough, hint hint, if you catch my drift. And likewise, some have very often thought that leviathan was probably, or at least based on, the crocodile.

That said, there's really no reason to think that modern cryptids have any relationship to the Hebrew fantastical beasts.

I'd love nothing more if the loch ness monster, or some other really amazing cryptid were real--but they are almost certainly not real, without any more evidentiary support behind them than UFOs having little green men visiting earth, or any other modern tall tales.

-CryptoLutheran

AV1611VET said:

So what was Nebraska Man? myth or legend?

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There is/was no Nebraska Man.

Florida Man, otoh.....