Religious belief

[Buster's Uncle]

No sweat.  I was just being a nerd about a casual remark Elok made in the quoted passage; I'm sure he actually knows better.

[Elok]

It puts the Sun at the center of the universe, which is ridiculous on the face of it, and long proven to be in gross error.

Hopefully Lori will, hopefully, amplify on that from his considerable formal training in the science...

If the universe is actually infinite, it seems to me that any given point could be arbitrarily described as the center without real inaccuracy.

(no real answer comes to mind for your last post, honestly, tho' technically I'll be gone Monday; I don't generally abide by the pedantic everything-begins-the-night-before custom for things like Friday fasting, so I don't apply it to Lent)

[Valka]

Well, since our solar system is considerably younger than the universe itself, it's a pretty safe bet that this isn't where it started. Otherwise the Sun would be over 8 billion years older than it is and would never have had planets (since the early universe was really short on chemical elements that weren't hydrogen and helium).

[Buster's Uncle]

True, true.

There's a real arrogance to any spiritual position that puts man and earth at the center of all things - some pragmatic reason, but none to force the POV on science.

[Lorizael]

There's not a good definition for the center of the universe, in the same way that there's not a good definition for the center of the surface of a sphere.

Heliocentrism today is simply understood to mean that the sun is the center of the solar system rather than the Earth. What BU is getting at is the Copernican Principle in astronomy, which is that nothing about us is special in any way. This principle (which is essentially a well-supported assumption, not something that needs to be true) does some work in cosmology. The Earth isn't special, the Sun isn't special, the Milky Way isn't special, the Local Group isn't special, etc.

In a certain sense, this principle is useful and accurate. On the largest scales, no matter what direction you look, the universe looks about the same on average. And our region of the universe doesn't appear significantly different from other regions of the universe. But in another sense, the principle is demonstrably, laughably wrong. Pick an Earth-sized region of the universe at random, and the odds are essentially 100% that it will not have properties even remotely similar to the Earth. Most of the universe is empty save for dark matter and dark energy.

Even above the scale of a planet, however, the universe clearly has some structure that violates the principle. We appear to live in webs of super clusters of galaxies, where things are relatively dense inside the clusters and basically empty outside of them. So the Copernican Principle only holds true "on the largest scales." Pick a cube 200 million light-years across and it will look basically the same as any other 200 million light year cube.

You can go wrong with extending the principle, however. During the 20th century, the ultimate extension of it was to say the universe was the same everywhere and everywhen. So no expansion, no big bang origin, no heat death fate. But relying on the principle there gets you the wrong answers, as far as we can tell. The universe does change. What's more, we appear to be living in an early epoch of the universe, which is a little special. Also, our universe began in a very low entropy state, which is unlikely and doesn't yet have a good physical explanation. So there's some specialness there, too.

[Buster's Uncle]

Another bit of my renfair accuracy/prop art:



Handmade dagger after several years of wearing in all weather.  Note the crude cross carved into the handle.

[Buster's Uncle]

2. Why are you getting involved in YT comment threads?  They're the cloaca of the internet.  You could look up a video on nineteenth-century Parisian architecture and the comments would still mostly be people calling each other faggots.  And they wouldn't even spell "[homosexual]" correctly.

Note that you can't say [homosexual]here -it a slur, and nothing but, unless you're referring to burning firewood or English cigarettes- but our swear filter sucks and I deem the use in this context -giving an example of uncouth beyond-the-pale speech- acceptable.

Also, points for characterizing YouTube comments a lot more eloquently than I did.

I notice that the work I did on the swear list this week seems to have altered untouched posts retroactively - but since the plural form of the term still got through, no need to edit the post for clarity...

[Unorthodox]

So, it's Good Friday. 

In a meeting with a dozen people in purple who commented on my orange, explaining you're supposed to wear purple on Good Friday?

I commented I thought Red was the religiously observed color for Good Friday to represent the Passion? 

Everyone got silent staring at each other for a moment there before we moved on to business. 

Google tells me I am likely more correct for today, but the rest of the folks there were probably raised with the Purple standard:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liturgical_colours

[Valka]

I remember being told that purple and yellow were "Easter colors" but was never told why.

[Buster's Uncle]

Nothing about Easter colors in my native culture/religion...

[Buster's Uncle]

It turns out the walking stick I carved a Jesus face onto had fallen behind the piano...

[Unorthodox]

This year I learned LDS missionaries are under curfew for Halloween night, but general Halloween activities are acceptable, even on a Sunday.  (yet half the locals were offended by the Sunday timing of the party) 

[E_T]

This year I learned LDS missionaries are under curfew for Halloween night, but general Halloween activities are acceptable, even on a Sunday.  (yet half the locals were offended by the Sunday timing of the party)

Yeah, the excuse is so as not to be confused with someone dressed up as one of them...  begs the question, do they have other clothes than the standard missionary outfit??  They can't dress up in something that they aren't (for one night)?? 

The English have (mostly) been indoctrinated to stay indoors for the night, due to the demonizing of the Pagan highest of Holys  (instead of incorporating into the state religion).

[Unorthodox]

I haven't "gone out" on Halloween myself for over 30 years.  There are other ways to celebrate,  but it seemed more a complete moratorium, as these 2 gals were happy to mention how thrilled they were to be able to get some Halloween cheer, which they missed.  They even helped clean pumpkins prior to the party.  (which is to say they cleaned one or two each, it's REALLY hard to keep up with me on cleaning pumpkins, as it takes 2 people lifting pumpkins, and 2 cutting lids to keep up with me if I'm just scooping out)

Never talked anything besides Halloween with me, though I did see them yacking with some member neighbors about the whole sunday party situation.  Could I put them in a witch outfit though?  That bears asking in the future.   

[Unorthodox]

Oh, slight update I guess, since BU linked to this thread. 

Seems the church likes to rotate the female missionaries through every six months or so, as we've been through 2 sets since those two nice ladies in 2016.  They stopped to talk to me whenever I was out working.

The spring set were more the traditional missionary type, didn't want to talk much about anything but the religion, so we didn't interact much. 

The ones here for Halloween 2017 were none too interested in anything Halloween, and actively avoided talking to me when I was outside working on things and did not come for the party, despite knowing where they were housed and making sure the invite got placed.  So, never got to ask about the costumes.   

I was also rather rude and absolutely terrified a couple Jehovah's Witnesses.  Genuinely feel bad about it, since they had their child with them.  They caught me at a really bad time/mood, and, well, it's done.