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Clades

Posted: Wed Feb 11, 2015 2:23 pm
by Clive
A clade (from Ancient Greek: κλάδος, klados, "branch") or monophylum (see monophyletic) is a group consisting of an ancestor and all its descendants, a single "branch" on the "tree of life". The ancestor may be an individual, a population or even a species (extinct or extant).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clade


I think classical history is able quite easily to become far more 'scientific' by doing some borrowing.

Studying fossils is all about comparing and contrasting and slowly building up a huge jigsaw that spreads now over billions of years.

I see no reason why similar methods should not be used on ancient documents. The sophistication of data mining and audit tools is now very impressive.


Using the key terms, for example sophia, spirit, angel, prince of light, emmanuel, use of nomina sacra, why is there not an agreed clade diagram?
I want to talk with you a bit about The Ancestor's Tale. What made you want to write a book that was more general than your other works, that encompassed ground that you've previously covered?

It doesn't really cover previous ground. I've never written about the actual detailed facts of evolutionary history before. My previous books have all been attempts to make evolution easier to understand, to make theory easier to understand. This is the first book that really lays out the detailed facts of evolutionary history.

In doing so, you took an unconventional approach, starting with humans and moving back in time to the origins of life. What were the challenges of that approach?

Well, it was a bit difficult, because history obviously does go forward, and the language of narrative tends to move forward. So there were slight problems there. I think it was worth it, because if you do your history forwards, it looks as though evolution is aimed at the endpoint. And if the endpoint happens to be humans, as it is likely to be—because we are human and we are most interested in humans—then it looks as though history were aimed at humans from the start, and that's positively wrong. The advantage of going backwards is that you always come to a climax at the origin of life, no matter where you start. So that was the rationale for doing it, but it did of course present some problems.

In the introduction, you explain the rationale for using Chaucer's Canterbury Tales as a model, and you describe aspects of The Ancestor's Tale that correspond to it. Literature uses many mythic themes and allegories. What should be the place of myth and religion in literature, and in the internal life of man, as opposed to science?

I occasionally use the imagery of religion because it's part of our culture and because you can't understand literature without it. It's something that's deeply built into everybody's consciousness in the English-speaking world, so to use religious imagery, whether it's from Chaucer or from the Bible, resonates with people. I'm not sure I understood your question.

http://www.americanscientist.org/booksh ... rd-dawkins

Re: Clades

Posted: Wed Feb 11, 2015 2:37 pm
by MrMacSon

Re: Clades

Posted: Thu Feb 12, 2015 12:42 am
by Clive
Thanks :-)
Mark was the first writer to infer that Jesus was supernatural and thus did not have 'being' in the conventional sense
(from other thread)

For example, are we sure about the dating of documents or might the conventional dating frameworks reflect theological arguments?

Are mentions of Pilate and Quirinus really data points?

Might other documents like Shepherd of Hermas be earlier than Mark? What if Paul predates Pilate?

Re: Clades

Posted: Thu Feb 12, 2015 12:53 am
by Clive
I am inclined to suggest that your reading of the Epistle of Barnabas is informed by a set of evidence or broader theory derived from your understanding of other texts and the general development of early Christianity. And perhaps mine is also, although I have not completely worked out what it is. And it is for the defense of theories with great explanatory power that we may occasionally dig in our heels against reading a certain piece of evidence a certain way, when that certain way would be evidence against the theory.

I believe you could say with some justice that this happens when a Drews, Couchoud, Wells, Doherty, or Carrier reads certain passages, say in the letters of Paul. But I also believe it could be said with some justice of things that don't quickly snap into place for a historicist understanding of Christian origins. I believe it is our responsibility to recognize these bits of recalcitrant data as such,
I think it should not be too difficult to construct an agreed system complete with outliers and disputes and then think through what fits, maybe it is something else.

Re: Clades

Posted: Thu Feb 12, 2015 8:14 am
by Peter Kirby
This works at all only to the extent that we refer only to features that demonstrate sure signs of dependence.
Using the key terms, for example sophia, spirit, angel, prince of light, emmanuel, use of nomina sacra, why is there not an agreed clade diagram?
So this doesn't work. Maybe you could argue that the term emmanuel or phrase prince of light or just possibly nomina sacra requires a line of dependence, but that is shaky. The rest are more shaky. They are all just common words. And even once you've established that dependence is required, there are still uncertainties that would go into coming into an "agreed clade diagram."

Re: Clades

Posted: Thu Feb 12, 2015 10:04 am
by Clive
I would be a lot more optimistic about what is possible than that. Accents and dialects are being tracked with fascinating insights occurring. Language is a matter of repetition and reinterpretation of what someone else has said, it isn't a matter of just following a few phrases, but looking at all the literature and how they all relate to each other.

It is a big job but we have the technology! It is strange, the changes that have occurred in forensics and archaeology seem to have left religious texts in a backwater.

Re: Clades

Posted: Thu Feb 12, 2015 10:08 am
by Clive
For example, using these and related techniques
The phrase forensic linguistics first appeared in 1968 when Jan Svartvik, a professor of linguistics, used it in an analysis of statements by Timothy John Evans.[2]

During the early days of forensic linguistics in the United Kingdom, the legal defence for many criminal cases questioned the authenticity of police statements. At the time, customary police procedure for taking suspects' statements dictated that it be in a specific format, rather than in the suspect's own words. Statements by witnesses are very seldom made in a coherent or orderly fashion, with speculation and backtracking done out loud. The delivery is often too fast-paced, causing important details to be left out.

Early work of forensic linguistics in the United States concerned the rights of individuals with regard to understanding their Miranda rights during the interrogation process.[clarification needed] An early application of forensic linguistics in the United States was related to the status of trademarks as words or phrases in the language. One of the bigger cases involved fastfood giant McDonald's claiming that it had originated the process of attaching unprotected words to the 'Mc' prefix (referred to as McWords) and was unhappy with Quality Inns International's intention of opening a chain of economy hotels to be called 'McSleep.'[3]

In the 1980s, Australian linguists discussed the application of linguistics and sociolinguistics to legal issues.[citation needed] They discovered that a phrase such as ' the same language ' is open to interpretation. Aboriginal people have their own understanding and use of 'English', something that is not always appreciated by speakers of the dominant version of English, i.e., 'white English'. The Aboriginal people also bring their own culturally based, interactional styles to the interview.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forensic_linguistics