Posts on science and history: 10/17/2018 – Science and history once more July 27, 2018 – Science or stories 3/13/2018 – Science and history again 2/19/2018 – Distinguishing history and science January 17, 2017 – Combining history and science September 19, 2016 – History and science once again December 15, 2015 – From history to …
Most Christian congregations have an ethnos, a term from cultural anthropology for people with a common national or cultural tradition. Congregations are usually part of a larger network, denomination, or hierarchy, which has at least one ethnos. (Eastern) Orthodox autocephalous churches are national churches, which include the ethnos of their nation. The (Roman) Catholic church …
The Bible includes a creation narrative of the universe in general and humanity in particular and a worldwide flood narrative. Are these accurate? That is usually interpreted as the question: are these the earliest accounts? Let’s see. There are many ancient accounts of creation (see here and here) and flood (see here and here). These …
History within the bounds of science is surely the only genuine history. That should not be controversial. If perpetual motion machines are scientifically impossible, then claims that one was invented in the past must be rejected. Does history only within the bounds of science exclude the resurrection of Christ from history? No, since there is …
Synchrony or diatopy means 3D space with simultaneous events in order of increasing time. Space-time is synchronic or diatopic. Diachrony means 3D time with simulocuous events in order of decreasing distance. Time-space is diachronic. Chronicles and histories are diachronic. Models and theories are synchronic or diatopic. Knowledge of the distances between objects is important in …
Science has no stories. Stories have characters, plots, and narratives. Science has data, hypotheses, postulates, and theories. Science and stories are different. They should be kept separate. Stories can refer to science or be about scientists, but that is not part of science. Science can refer to stories or collect data from stories, but that …
The following chronology is based on the Timeline of the Revolutionary War and other sources. French & Indian War 1754-1763 (part of the European war called the Seven Years War) – English victory was at the cost of a large debt. “It was that debt that caused the escalation of tensions leading to the Revolutionary War.” …
This post continues a series on history and science, see here and here. The development of the comparative method in linguistics led to the genealogy of languages in the 19th century. This diachronic approach was largely abandoned in the 20th century with the rise of synchronic theories. In short, linguistics pivoted from history to science. …
There are many ways to order events. One way is by time. Events happening at the same time are put in an equivalence class, which is then ordered from the earliest time to the latest time. History is usually ordered this way. With the advent of mechanical clocks and watches, modern people typically experience events …
To some extent the sciences of society and history can be pursued as if they were natural sciences. For example, groups of people exhibit some characteristics of natural objects, and so reflect physics to some extent. On the other hand, the physics of social beings is different in a complementary way from the physics of …
