Jonah and the whale - It happened!

TO ALL STRING POSTERS:There seems to be a concerted effort among many string particpants to keep using the fallacy which logicians call the genetic logical fallacy. I find some individuals stubbornesss to keep using the same logical fallacy as dragging down the quality of the debate unnecessarily. I see the last post as being a textbook example of this fallacy.Please read this material:"Genetic FallacyType:
Red HerringExposition:
The Genetic Fallacy is the most general fallacy of irrelevancy involving the origins or history of an idea. It is fallacious to either endorse or condemn an idea based on its past--rather than on its present--merits or demerits, unless its past in some way affects its present value. For instance, the origin of evidence can be quite relevant to its evaluation, especially in historical investigations. The origin of testimony--whether first hand, hearsay, or rumor--carries weight in evaluating it.
In contrast, the value of many scientific ideas can be objectively evaluated by established techniques, so that the origin or history of the idea is irrelevant to its value. For example, the chemist Kekul claimed to have discovered the ring structure of the benzene molecule during a dream of a snake biting its own tail. While this fact is psychologically interesting, it is neither evidence for nor against the hypothesis that benzene has a ring structure, which had to be tested for correctness.So, the Genetic Fallacy is committed whenever an idea is evaluated based upon irrelevant history. To offer Kekul's dream as evidence either for or against the benzene ring hypothesis would be to commit the Genetic Fallacy."What makes this really sad is I see no proof of a diploma mill being offered and see the allegation as being pure conjecture.I also see no attempt to address the content.Sincerely,Ken[This message has been edited by kendemyer, 02-25-2004]

Whoa, hold on there.You were the one who set this paper up as an academic paper to back up your nonsense.
(Intelligent adults know this stuff is folklore but be that as it may.)I just went ahead and checked the author out. He is not a professional in any way on history, theology or archeology.He has a qualification from a school whose website seems not to exist. A school that seems to have no accreditation.i.e. a typical Bible college degree mill - probably was mail order.But you set this up as academic - I found it to be not academic.

This is perhaps the funniest thing I have ever read on this web site. Are you seriously suggesting that Brian didn't carefully read your essay in his novel length, point-by-point critique of it?I think he deserves some kind of award (or punishment? ) for his incredible patience.EDIT: Shoot, I'm sorry, forgot to get out of admin mode again...[This message has been edited by AdminTL, 02-25-2004]

To AdminTL and Brian:If we are going to criticize others we need to be especially careful ourselves when criticizing them. I do not see why this is at all unreasonable. As far as the length of my initial post, I would say I had a lot to cover. And I in no way see the length of my initial post as a license to do a critique without first adequetely reading it first. I would say that if Brian did not have the time to adequately read my initial post he should have refrained from offering a lengthy critique or simply addressed fewer points. I would also hope that you do not believe one critiqueing is above constructive criticism.Now I will say I was somewhat surprised and disappointed by Brian's recent post in that my first interaction with Brian was largely a positive experience even though we had our divergent positions. In fact, I complimented Brian on a question he posed to me. I would have to say though that I do not think he was careful at all when he offered his large initial critique of my recent essay. I believe I give more than ample evidence of why his critique was lacking. Now, I know he can do better. I expect he will.To All:I am sensing a lot of anger since ConsequentAtheist made his ad hominem that backfired. I would say that I did not cause ConsequentAtheist to behave as he chose to. It was a self inflicted wound that I felt needed to be commented upon in order to make the point he was not reading the material he so vehemently criticized. I also felt his attack upon the writer was the equivalent of an emotional rant and very bitter. I wish no ill will of the rooms participants and I do not believe anyone could say I was being unreasonable with ConsequentAtheist.To: ALL and Et CarinaeNow Eta Carinae stated the following:"His only qualifications I could find was a degree from a Covenant College and a M. Divinity from Sangre De Christo Seminary in Westcliffe Colorado. I'm not even sure this place exists anymore, their website doesn't work. Looks like your typical Christian degree mill with no real academic standing."Now if what Eta Carinae said is true (I have not verified it) then I would offer the following websites:Covenant College:Covenant College HomeSangre De Christo Seminary:http://sangre-de-cristo.com/westcliffe/sdcs/Now here is an important point. The move to Monotheism was supported by Nat Wilson in his footnote which mentioned the New Unger's Bible Dictionary. Now if you want to attack that dictionary here is a web address: http://www.biblesoft.com/html/newunger.html . I also believe you are going to have to attack the Endnoted sources that the author of the Investigator Magazine used in order to make your genetic logical fallacy complete because he also cited the move to monotheism. But why bother? If you are going to truly be a freethinker you need to stop using logical fallacies.I think that the tone of the room needs to improve if we are going to have a productive conversation. I am hoping that will occur. Maybe it won't but I do hope it does.[This message has been edited by kendemyer, 02-26-2004]

As much as I would like to believe that you are listening to any critique of your work, I don't believe you are.Brian's tone in his lengthy critique was informative, careful, and for the most part non-judgemental. You posted a paper that you have discussed publishing. Brian, as a teacher, gave you an editorial analysis of your writing and research style. He offered suggestions for making your point in a more scholarly way. He gave insights into how to present your information in a more ordered fashion.He didn't discuss whether or not your information was factual, except in instances where his educational background gave him insight. He DID discuss whether or not you had actually made your case for them being factual. He offered assistance in helping you get primary sourse information for your paper.I feel that your tone towards Brian was unbecoming an adult who has recieved invaluable and timeconsuming help with a paper he wants published. As you will find, if you attempt to publish in any type of scholarly or mainstream publication, an editor will tear your work apart.

---

AdminAsgara
Queen of the Universe

To AdminAsgara:I have offered my commentary in regards to the quality and tone of Brian's critique. I do think at least three of of his criticisms was valid as far as 3 websites content (Botta, a one letter misspelling of a scientific designation for great white sharks perhaps, a small chronological misordering as far as the B.C. dates of two famines in a sentence although the actual dates may be correct which I will fact check through my written sources)and for that I am indebted to Brian. I certainly do not believe that I or the websites I offered are above criticism. However, I also believe that when we criticize another work there should be a fairly high standard and the one critiqueing at a bare minimum needs to read points that the author made very clear and discussed at length(Bartley). As far as the tone of Brian's criticique we only differ in our estimation by a matter of degree. You wrote: "for the most part non-judgemental". That is where we obviously disagree. I think we should just agree to disagree on that point. I do believe, however, I demonstated my postion in terms of the tone. I would also say I did offer one positive experience of Brian as well.I would also say that I agree with you in terms of what an editors responsibility is but I would also say that Brian is in no way my editor nor am I his or any others editor at this forum. I offer no commentary other than on substance or to point out gross violations of decorum. I also see that you did not disagree with me that criticizing style over substance is a logical fallacy.As far as the rest of Brian's critique I will obviously address that in a later post using my resources because there is obviously a difference of opinion on many points. I will also review Brian critiques further as I want to be careful in my commentary and I have not had a chance to fully and adequately review it at this point.Sincerely,Ken[This message has been edited by kendemyer, 02-26-2004]

The point is that your suggestion that Brian had not read your work is ridiculous, considering his point by point discussion of the entire thing! You basically nitpicked at a couple things and then suggested he didn't read it properly.People are trying to tell you it really wasn't worth reading as thoroughly as Brian read it. Yet you had the audacity to suggest he didn't read it enough.Listen, he read it enough to catch that you said Jonah must have been slim, because a sperm whale only has a 1.5 foot wide gullet, but then you said a sperm whale could swallow a 4-5 foot square box (that's 2x2 at the smallest, with about 2 3/4 feet from corner to corner). He read it carefully enough to point out to you that you provided not one shred of evidence that a person can survive inside a whale.But worst of all, he read it carefully enough to point out to you that you used two example of people who were not swallowed at all, which was utterly pointless, and really was enough to make anyone else just throw your paper away. Brian kindly continued, because he's autistic or something (just kidding, Brian) and able to stay focused on a subject far longer than anyone I know.Then, you, instead of thanking him for pointing out exactly why people are ignoring what you say and even scoffing at you a bit, SAY THAT HE HASN'T READ YOU PAPER WELL ENOUGH!!!It doesn't get much worse than that, Mr. kendemyer.

TO Brian and Truthlover and ALL:I wish the skeptics could agree on things. First, there were complaints from skeptics who did not read my essay carefully that there was not enough information supporting the Book of Jonah but now there seems to be a complaint that my initial post was entirely too long. I wish the skeptics would find more agreement on this issue.Secondly, it is true that I accidently included the Nye Pelig whale account under the heading of men who were swallowed and there certainly is no definite proof at this time that he was swallowed. However, when I first read the Nye Pelig account I was agnostic in regards to whether Mr. Peleg was swallowed or not. Brian and Truthlover are asserting the Mr. Pelig was never swallowed (Brian stated: "However, Peleg wasn’t even swallowed by the sperm whale so why include it here?" ). But seeing as the whale is purported to have taken Mr. Pelig under the water and Mr. Pelig purportedly went unconscious I do not see how you can assert he was never swallowed. I believe I think it is reckless to say he was not swallowed although I have admitted I certainly should have provided commentary that he was not actually reported to have been swallowed and was not precise in my heading. In short, I think my agnosticism regarding the actual issue of Nye Pelig being swallowed at any point is the most judicious position although I am leaning toward the not swallowed position. I have already stated additional commentary regarding some the weakness in regards to the Pelig account and Jonah so I will not reiterate.It also seems that Truthlover is no better of a critic than Brian. First here is what Brian states:"This is total rubbish Ken, and does nothing to support Jonah’s narrative. The shark did not swallow the sailor whole, he was in its throat."Here is what Truthlover states:"But worst of all, he read it carefully enough to point out to you that you used two example of people who were not swallowed at all, which was utterly pointless, and really was enough to make anyone else just throw your paper away."Here is a abbreviated version of the account with key passages:"A shark was close by, which, as he was swimming and crying for help took him in his wide throat, so that he forthwith disappeared...
From all this, it is probable that this was the fish of Jonah."Is there 100% proof from these passages he was swallowed whole. No there is not. Perhaps, he was taken underwater for a bit. Perhaps, he wasn't. We do know that the sailor DISAPPEARED. Also, we do know it was compared to Jonah. I personally do not think the Book of Jonah is riding on this shark account nor can it be used against it. I do think it demonstrates a sloppy critique of Brian's and a sloppy commentary of Brian's critique by Truthlover.Lastly, it is possible that the Bullen account is accurate although it is certainly not required because of the testimony I believe I gave through the science instructor at Seaworld's commentary which seems to be in line with the museum director's account. I will haved more to say about the Bullen account later. Plus I will provide further commentary in resonse to Brian's critique.[This message has been edited by kendemyer, 02-26-2004][This message has been edited by kendemyer, 02-26-2004]

Hi Ken,I would like to say a word or two about the four examples you give in this post.1. Botta: I didnt say whether you were right or wrong, all I did was provide a contrary report, which was to alert you to the fact that you need to investigate this to see if Botta was first or Layard was first.2. Regarding the 'one letter misspelling of a scientific designation for great white sharks'.You say: Another creature large enough to swallow a man is the voracious White Shark Carcharius vulgaris I said the shark's designation is 'Carcharodon carcharias', now where is the one letter difference between these terms?3. Regarding Bartley, I am at a loss as to why you appear to think that I was correcting you or something. I know that you said that in all likelihood the story was a hoax, I provided the letter from the captain's wife so you could use it to support your suspicion. You can now say it was definately a hoax, I provided the letter as a source for you to use in a positive way, I did not post it to try and prove you wrong about something. You need to stop being so defensive Ken.4. I was not questioning whether the famines happened or not, I was informing you that you appear to be confused about how the BC dating system works. For example, 856 BC would come before 342 BC, or 5500 BC would come before 5 BC, I only pointed out the way in which the dating works.Finally, there were some parts of your essay that I didnt address, but I thnk you have enough to be going on with.I know you said there are at least three criticisms that are valid, well I really think the number of problems you have to address in this essay is somewhere in the high 70's. For example, your title is incorrect, the Hebrew does not say 'great fish' because 'great fish' is English. Also, you fail to tell your readers that the Hebrew word for fish is different in one of the verses.Also, in relation to your essay title, you also wander off your title's claim several times. Your title only mentions the scientific and historical plausibility and your keep insisting that God intervened, which is not what your title tells the reader to expect.But I know you are busy so I hope we can speak more soon.Incidently, I am in Uni tomorrow and I have put a hold on two archaeological surveys of Nineveh so I can provide you with some more archaeological and historical data probably on saturday.Take care Ken.

Ken,Your initial post was comepletely against forums rules, I should have really jumped on it but I failed to do my admin job properly.When this amount of data is included at the introduction of a thread it is difficult to address all the points.We really should only deal with two or three points at a time.However, I didnt jump on it in my admin capacity so I accept responsibility for allowing your post to stand as is.Also, one problem that I noticed with my critique of your essay was that the essay I downloaded had changed before I uploaded my reply.Brian.[This message has been edited by Brian, 02-26-2004]

Dear Brian:This is what you wrote in regards to the Bartley account:"Ken, this is one benefit of using a decent quality library as opposed to poor quality websites, you can examine the actual sources yourself and come to your own conclusions. You should question everything you read, do not take anyone’s word for anything, use you core skills to form your own work."I have come to the conclusion that you thought I believed the Bartley account and did not read my essay carefully. But you say:"Regarding Bartley, I am at a loss as to why you appear to think that I was correcting you or something. I know that you said that in all likelihood the story was a hoax, I provided the letter from the captain's wife so you could use it to support your suspicion."At this point I am going to let your words speak for themselves and I offer no further commentary at this time. In short, I wish to move on at this particular junction.Lastly, I do not know why you insist on style over substance and continue to commit this logical fallacy. Here is some website commentary you should consider:"the truth of the conclusion does not depend on the manner in which the argument is presented. In order to show that this fallacy is being committed, show that the style in this case does not affect the truth or falsity of the conclusion."taken from: Page not found - Intrepid SoftwareNow if you could show me how a one letter or two letter or one word difference or two word difference of a scientific designation of the great white shark shows why or why not the Book of Jonah is any more true or false I would certainly like to know. In short, I wish to know if you wish to continue to use the style over substance logical fallacy. It seems to me that if you truly want to be a freethinker you would want to not use logical fallacies and you would wish to discuss more substantive issues. I guess if you continue to want to dwell on minutae that is not relevant to the Book of Jonah you can but I can certainly point out how illogical you are being or merely ignore your minutae. However, if you could spend more time on specific points of authors that are relevant to the Book of Jonah I think you would be doing the readers and yourself a favor. I also wish to add it seems as if you must dwell on minutiae it reveals the fact that you cannot )or at least will not at the very least) address the more substantive evidence.As far as your other comments I am afraid you will have to wait until I am able to attend to them. It might not be for a while but I do not want to be pessimistic.Postscript:Just to satisfy your curiousity, somewhat I do not know if the author was merely one letter off or one word and a letter off. I really have no real certainty how far the author was. I do not have any expertise in interpreting scientific designations for animals nor in the history of scientific designations for various animals. I suspect you might not have such expertise either but maybe you do. There appears to be scientific designation synonyms that have been used at various points in time. Here is a website's info:Squalus (Carcharias) vulgaris Richardson, 1836see: http://www.deh.gov.au/...rks/greatwhite/manual.html#synonymsSincerely,Ken[This message has been edited by kendemyer, 02-26-2004]

Hi Ken,Finally I see what the problem is!!!!!!!!! Please take this in. I am not trying to argue if the Book of Jonah is accurate or not, the point of my critique was to point out to you that if you wished to get published you would have to produce work of a far better quality than this.I assessed your essay as I would assess any students essay in order to highlight where you could improve the strength of your arguments. If you go to a publisher Ken you will have to provide references to support everything you say in your article. You will not get away with saying things such as 'some people say this' or 'Nineveh was the capital of Assyria', the publisher really wouldnt entertain work of this quality.Getting published is a long process Ken, a publisher would normally give your work to an expert to critique before they would even consider publishing it. But, I think the way you suport your claims you wouldnt get that far anyway.So try and understand, I am not saying whether the Jonah narrative is accurate or not, I am merely pointing out areas where you have to tighten things up a bit. The sort of things I am pointing out are essentially the same things that most teachers/tutors would point out.The reason I insist on substance is because it is substance that gets published. I know that someone could write an essay about Robert the Bruce for example, and that essay could be very very poor academically and this doesn't affect that the things alluded to in the essay about Robert the Bruce didnt happen. However, the essay might still fail because the author of the essay failed to mention important points, or presented contradictory evidence, or included inaccurate information.What I am saying is the Jonah story may be accurate, but the way you present your information is not convincing. Your essay, as it is, truly would not pass any high school assessment, well not at my school anyway.So you need to stop thinking that I am out to try and say that everything I criticised was incorrect, I am criticising your research and presentation only.I hope this clears things up.Brian.

To Brian:Given your statement in regards to your Bartley commentary I cannot say I trust your motives for wanting to address minutiae over substance. Even if true, and I do not believe the motives you stated are the real motives, one would think that if I wanted some stylistic help I would have asked for it. But at the very least, I would say that if one wishes to dwell on stylistic minutiae in great length order to help he would certainly ask before doing so. But again, given your Bartley defense that is rather a moot point I believe. By the way, if you have noticed there does not seem to be a throng of supporters to rush to say your Bartley commentary was valid in regards to my writing. I believe I am not alone in my estimation of its inadaquecy (perhaps you could find a few shills or sign in under a different name and offer a glowing appraisal of your Bartley commentary). As I stated, a fundamental requirement of editorializing is that you read the material carefully. In short, first socks then shoes. You seem to have wanted to get your shoes of criticism on hastily and then it was quite easy for me to demonstrate "the emperor" had no socks. I hope you found my belly/Pelig/shark swallowing and other commentary useful as well. I think it may be wasted though. If you have dificulty publically accepting your mistakes, and so far you have not acknowledged any of them, I think you may be too stubborn to change at this time. I believe I have readily admitted my mistakes but you seem not to want to. That is certainly your choice, however, but I believe it is a bad choice.Sincerely,Ken[This message has been edited by kendemyer, 02-26-2004]

Hi, What is troubling you about the Bartley commentary? You suspected it was a hoax, I gave you an eyewitness account to support your claim, so what exactly is the problem?Ken, substance is made up of minutae, if your minutae is poor then the substance will be poor. Publishers and assessors concentrate on minutae to see if it provides substance.Why on earth would I be lying to you? Yes, but I do not think that you are aware that you need help, when it is patently obvious that you do. So you do not welcome help then? That is fine, it saves me a lot of time. You really need to explain this to me, I truly do not know what you are on about. Virtually any one of my students would reduce your essay to a pile of trash, honestly. I have read it carefully, every point I made is relevant. You are having some sort of psychotic episode here Ken, this is the worst case of denial I have seen. I found it useful, mostly because you kept getting the man's name wrong! His name was Pelig Nye, not 'Nye Pelig' or Mr. Pelig or Mr. Peleg, sorry to pick up on minutae again but it does form the substance of an argument, what a great example. I didnt make a mistake, I commented on the text, you added to the text. You admitted very few, but you ignored some pretty huge one, such as forgetting that Jesus mentioned Moses. Ken, it is your essay that is being critiqued, if you really want to debate the topic of whether the Jonah account is scientifically or historically plausible then I do not think this would be beneficial for you at this time.My critique was to assit you, you can either take my advice or ignore it, but trust me, the advice is valuable.Brian.

You are soooo patient. I suspect you are a good teacher. However, this one isn't going to get it. I am tempted to nominate Kenny for a POTM just to show the kind of thing that is possible.