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Post by timothylane on Dec 4, 2019 12:19:45 GMT -8
I admit I'm no expert on the northwest Indians. My knowledge of the potlatch custom comes, I think, from the work of anthropologist Marvin Harris in works such as The Sacred Cow and the Abominable Pig, which focus on the origins of dietary customs. S. P. Somtow had his characters visit some northwestern Indians (who turned out to be transplanted Jews, who proved to be very fond of smoked salmon on annular loves, especially smeared with cream cheese) in The Aquiliad.
The idea that humans originated in Africa goes back nearly a century, so I doubt political correctness has anything to do with it. It would be possible that hominids evolved in both eastern Asia (after all, Borneo is especially noted for orangutans) and Africa (from which they could fairly easily spread to the Middle East and then Europe).
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Brad Nelson
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עַבְדְּךָ֔ אֶת־ הַתְּשׁוּעָ֥ה הַגְּדֹלָ֖ה הַזֹּ֑את
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Post by Brad Nelson on Dec 4, 2019 13:17:27 GMT -8
I’m looking for a book on the subject. There is one that sound promising: Northwest Native Harvest. It even supposedly includes some recipes. One reason I know a little about their diet is because I live here too. And have learned a bit of history here and there. But it’s fairly readily apparent what there is to eat, and most of that is supplied by the sea. Whether they grew crops or not, I don’t know. What plants they used for medicines, I don’t know. But I know salmon, oysters, clams, nuts, berries, and probably most of the other stuff they et. Having just Googled a bit on the subject, it’s surprising that there isn’t a lot of information readily available. Nearly every link leads to some college web page or other type of general resource page where they say they will talk about such things in a class. Or it’s just the equivalent of “All hail Native Americans, weren’t they great?” But no details. Virtue signaling doesn’t exactly tell me what they et or may have planted. Here is at least 16 Photos of Traditional Cooking, the Salish Way. Frankly, I don’t know much about that tribe…almost to the point of never heard of them. I guess via this map, being in Montana is consider northwest. We in the northwest don’t think Montana is in the northwest. Oh…but one of those photos does remind me that stinging nettles can be made into a tea. Never tried it myself. Cattails (at least the tender roots or shoots) is another thing I’ve heard you can eat. I’d like to eat at this chef’s restaurant. I’d love to try that dandelion quiche. Something tells me that real Northwest Native Americans would have not recognized that quiche as a native food. But it sure looks good. Salal berries. Yes, I’ve eaten them. But I’ve never tried to make anything out of them. I didn’t know the leaves had medicinal properties. Looking down through those photos, I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a chokeberry. I think I’ve heard of them but am not sure. Huckleberries. Woo hoo! Yes. I’m very familiar with those. I’d love to try that elk meat stew they have pictured. It’s thickened with cattail flour and contains quahmash root. What’s a quamash? Never heard of it. camassia quamash
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Post by timothylane on Dec 4, 2019 14:26:36 GMT -8
Perhaps the Salish started out further west and were driven across the Continental Divide. The Sioux started out in North Carolina, but of course we associate them with the Great Plains.
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Post by timothylane on Dec 4, 2019 17:02:48 GMT -8
I just checked on wikipedia, and it seems that the Salish originally referred solely to the Bitterroot Salish, the ones shown on the map you linked to. However, more recently it has also been used for coastal tribes of the northwest speaking similar languages. No doubt much or all of the cooking was from the coastal tribes.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 9, 2019 15:12:52 GMT -8
"The Age of Faith"
Durant's summation of Christianity's achievements during the period of AD 700-1300 is worth reading.
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Post by timothylane on Dec 9, 2019 15:21:12 GMT -8
I guess it was after this that the Church began to encourage science and technology. I wonder if this can be linked to Thomas Aquinas.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 9, 2019 15:30:04 GMT -8
"The Age of Faith"
It would appear many people today, believe they have come up with original ideas and insight into the state of man. I find St. Anselm who lived from 1033 t0 1109, came to the same conclusion some 1000 years ago, that many of today's SJWs espouse. Durant writes that in his treatise "Monlogion" Anselm;
Anselm had the brains to see objective truth, whereas today's barbarians wish to destroy anything approaching it. The big questions have always been with us and some who understand humanity have long known of the need for an objective truth. Without this, there will eventually be either tyranny or anarchy.
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Brad Nelson
Administrator
עַבְדְּךָ֔ אֶת־ הַתְּשׁוּעָ֥ה הַגְּדֹלָ֖ה הַזֹּ֑את
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Post by Brad Nelson on Dec 10, 2019 13:45:09 GMT -8
We might argue about how far objective truth can take us in what we can know about morals, etc. But the clear divide shows up in the “gender” issue whereby there is no longer a true male of female. It’s all just opinion, a matter of how one “feels” or self-identifies.
I got a kick out of an interview I saw recently of David Berlinski by libertarian Ben Shapiro. I guess I could find that video if I made the effort. There’s a good exchange at one point. Berlinski surprises me with his wisdom, especially as he rebukes what I think is the self-evidently lazy libertarian perspective.
I find Shapiro’s voice to be just barely tolerable. Back up about two minutes if you want a little more context to this exchange:
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 10, 2019 14:44:11 GMT -8
True, but Anselm knew that mankind must have some sort of benchmark from which to proceed. One can answer the question, "How far is it from Dallas to Seattle?" but cannot answer the question, "How far is it?" Context must be given. Without it life is an anarchic mess aka, libertarian paradise.
I love David Berlinski. I might sound like him if I were as intelligent as he is. We certainly appear to have very similar beliefs and thoughts as to society, mankind and existence. His comments on praying could apply to me.
I have never been a big fan of Ben Shapiro. I suspect that he, and most non-Israeli Jews who proclaim themselves libertarians, do so not so much out of true belief, but out of hope that by convincing non-Jews to become libertarians, they won't bother the Jews in their midst. I guess this is as good a reason for a political philosophy as any, but I believe it is something of a forlorn hope. What will today protect Jews in America, as it does every American, is adherence to good constitutional conservatism.
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Post by timothylane on Dec 10, 2019 14:52:13 GMT -8
This sounds like something from the beginning of Orson Scott Card's Secular Humanist Revival, which he used to do at SF conventions (i went to it twice). He would start by asking "Do you believe?" and then note that if you do without saying what it is you believe, then you're not thinking. (The implicit subject when evangelists ask this would be Jesus and the Resurrection.) So the proper answer was "Do we believe what?"
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 10, 2019 14:55:56 GMT -8
I like it that Berkinski points out the well-being of the whole can demand that certain taboos are imposed and certain behaviors are discouraged. This is something idiot libertarians cannot seem to swallow.
In their minds, the desires of a pimple on the rear should be able to control its own destiny and become gangrenous if that's what it wants. The rest of the body is of no importance to that pustule.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 10, 2019 20:41:58 GMT -8
"The Age of Faith"
Durant spends a good number of pages on St. Thomas Aquinas and then a few more on his "successors."
I found what he wrote about one of these, John Duns Scotus, of interest.
According to Durant, Duns Scotus' view on God is,
I find this willing suspension of disbelief to be a reasonable position for a person to take. It is certainly more satisfactory than predestination which arises from the logical hubris found in those like Calvin who are dead sure they know God.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 10, 2019 20:54:27 GMT -8
"The Age of Faith"
When discoursing on medicine of the Middle Ages Durant writes,
I could go on, but believe I have quoted enough to demonstrate just how rotten those Christians were to humanity. Couldn't they have done something more worthwhile than helping the sick? Maybe they could have spent the money on more circuses and bread.
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Post by timothylane on Dec 10, 2019 21:05:32 GMT -8
Note that one of the crusading knightly orders was the Knights of the Hospital (Hospitalers), the others being the Knights of the Temple (Templars) and the Teutonic Nights. The Templars were later suppressed by the French for money's sake, and I once read a suggestion that the Shroud of Turin was actual the shroud of Jacques Mornay, the Templar leader they tortured and killed. The Teutonic Nights soon did most of their crusading on the east coast of the Baltic. The Hospitalers are also known as the Knights of St. John.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 10, 2019 21:08:41 GMT -8
"The Age of Faith"
When writing of Epics and Sagas, Durant starts out with,
When ending a short history of El Cid, Durant mentions how the legend was quite different from the man and states,
I have for decades warned people that truth is a dangerous commodity.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 10, 2019 21:10:28 GMT -8
Iterations of which are still around.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 10, 2019 21:23:23 GMT -8
"The Age of Faith"
I should have posted this at the beginning of the pieces on Durant's "The Age of Faith", but I have not always followed the chronological order of Durant's books, so I hope readers will not be overly bothered by this fact. Durant writes at some length of the heresies which developed in early Christianity. Most of these, and certainly those which most threatened the unity of Christianity had to do with the nature of the Trinity and Christ. I will not go into these as they are many and the differences seem sometimes to be so slight as to cause one to wonder what drugs the early Church Fathers were taking. Else how could they enter into such vicious doctrinal fights about things which are not clearly laid out in the Bible, and claim certitude on subjects which are by their very nature unknowable? I will leave that thought and move on to Durant's handling of Islam, which some to be an offshoot of the major Christian heresy called Arianism. When writing of the "sources of Islam" Durant states,
There is more but I believe these passages give a fair idea of Islam's debt to Judaism.
As to Mohammed's debt to Christianity, Durant writes,
Durant closes this chapter by saying,
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Post by timothylane on Dec 10, 2019 21:57:10 GMT -8
As the newspaper editor points out in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, when the legend meets fact, print the legend.
I don't remember the exact details (they can probably be found in wikipedia), but one key difference between the Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox was known as the Filioque Dispute. Reportedly the Crusaders who took Constantinople in 1204 and set up a Latin Empire there. They would force the Byzantines in their churches to say, "Filioque! Filioque!"
L. Sprague De Camp had a scene in Lest Darkness Fall in which the protagonist (Martin Padway), finding himself back in Rome as Belisarius is about to invade the Ostrogoths, meets a group of people in an inn who have a variety of different views (Nestorian, Arian, Orthodox, Monophysite, maybe more). He tells each that he's a Unitarian, the closest thing his people had to all those views.
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Brad Nelson
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עַבְדְּךָ֔ אֶת־ הַתְּשׁוּעָ֥ה הַגְּדֹלָ֖ה הַזֹּ֑את
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Post by Brad Nelson on Dec 11, 2019 8:43:01 GMT -8
It’s more of a cosmetic thing that Ben Shapiro’s fast talking grates on me. On the other hand, there isn’t a lot to be said for fast-talkers.
The Libertarian position is consistent with the Progressive/Leftist position: There is to be the primacy of the self. Libertarians (theoretically) differ on how this social utopia is go come about. The (current) Progressive/Leftist position is that it will require an all-powerful nanny state to make sure all our choices are the “right” ones. The Libertarian position is that any and all government is the impediment to self-fulfillment.
With one high on Marx and the other on pot, I don’t put a lot of faith in either.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 11, 2019 19:58:05 GMT -8
"The Age of Faith"
Mohammed's debt to Judaism is further highlighted as regards law. Durant writes,
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