Don't put words in my mouth. Your assertions seemed baseless and I challenged them. They have not been supported by evidence. You evidently didn't like it.

Hey business_kid... How does you, or anyone, interpret "do I understand your position correctly?" as "putting words in your mouth" when it is a question displaying the fact that I am uncertain if I understand what you previously said and asking you to make it clearer?

As to the larger subject please answer me if you dispute the historical record whether Ancient (Greece, Rome, Holy Roman etc), Middle (witch hunts), Recent (Mao, Stalin, Hitler) or Current (Arabs vs Jews, Rwanda, Savings and Loan plus Real Estate debacles). BTW my response has nothing to do with my liking or not liking, let alone accepting any challenge. I like challenges. I simply dispute your apparent definition of "evidence".

Aside from the question of prophecy (which anyway belongs in the religion thread), I'm not even sure you two are disagreeing?

You both agree that human legal system are not perfect, yes? Is it just a matter of how much? Like business_kid maybe thinks ~95% of contracts were good, but enorbet thinks it's more like 50% (please correct my example numbers as you see fit)?

Or is it a disagreement about particular methods (bribery vs forgery)?

"The original-quote premise of this thread" was, indeed, that "myth does have value." And that what I carefully-defined as "myth" is very often the source of "common context." (Most especially in ancient times, when "means of durable communication" were virtually nonexistent.)

"Way back then," I was very careful to try to point out that "myth is not falsehood." Rather, at least I defined it, it is an honorable part of how we humans deal with our world. And, there are many "levels" to it, "from Zeus on down."

I self-defined the term to be "everything that we use when 'objective truth' is unobtainable." Which means that it is neither paired to [ancient ...] history nor to ignorance.

And I then went on to assert that "'myth' is necessarily a vital(!) part of 'abstract science.'" If we simply limited ourselves to what [we thought that ...] "our five senses" and "the experimental process" could tell us: (a) we wouldn't know much, and (b) one day our successors would discover that we were totally wrong. I choose to define "myth" and "conjecture" to be "very close cousins."

Sometimes, of course, "myths" turn out to be totally false. Sometimes, they turn out to be totally political. But this does not discredit the concept. Where, for whatever reason, "science" or "certain knowledge" cannot take us, "myth" fills the gap ... "at least for now."

I would agree - we're not particularly disagreeing about that. You don't have to look far today to see things being abused.Perhaps enorbet has learned something

New myth
if anyone is left alive later

https://www.npr.org/2022/12/06/11411...-robots-police

And you thought global warming might get ya.
Now terminator movies are in the myth catagory.

I'm alive.

Hello from Ireland D.

While I don't see many instances where police robots would need to kill. I suppose to prevent a criminal from killing someone else would be one instance. Frankly. since it's much easier to discover bad programming in a robot than underlying mental illness, prejudices and power junkie humans, I am less worried about so-called "killer robots" than killer human police. Just write in the condition than in any wrongful homicide the programmers are legally responsible and I'm pretty chill on the subject.

BTW since I've seen the new photos of some moon landing sites taken from 80 miles up by Artemis I'm curious as to how sundialsvcs is going to take this news since he apparently still believes in the myth that humans have never actually set foot on the moon, despite all the evidence to date and that is increasing in the here and now.

Here is a sample - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WZ26s4ik2w

Funny you should say that. My late father warned us all about "Invincible Ignorance" as he described it. It also comes disguised as "not enough evidence" and "<Insert any undervalued source> is valueless, therefore must be ignored." When confronted by I.I. the only solution was to flee. You couldn't prevail, because I.I. was invincible. But your sanity was at risk.

Typical undervalued sources are history, myth, Encyclopedias, those of the wrong political affiliation, sex or race, even God's Word.

I've seen those photos too, and dismiss them. I do not expect to live to see the day when we can actually shoot golf balls on the moon, while being fully exposed to the wrath of solar radiation without a magnetosphere to protect us. I hope that one day we will possess the technology that would be needed to survive that. We didn't have it in 1969, and we still don't have it today. Until we can solve the radiation problem, we're not going anywhere. Sux...

Yes, sundialsvcs, some forms of radiation are a serious problem but type, intensity and duration of exposure matter. Since the Van Allen Belts are well described by their title, literally belts, they were avoided for the Apollo flights. The exposure, absent solar flares, was easily handled by the layered materials in the main crew compartment, and one are was more heavily shielded to act as a retreat should a flare take place (none did). The end result was that none of the Apollo astronauts received doses stronger than a routine chest Xray because there were no flares, the shielding was quite adequate, and the exposure time was a few days.

Seriously, sundialsvcs, men walked on the moon. Deal with it. It is highly likely you will live to see men walk again on the moon. I hope even longer, possibly till at least when the first rigolith covered domes or caves are inhabited.

Had NASA or any nefarious government bureau actually set out to pull off the con of the millennium, why take the risk to repeat it?.... 6 times!! You don't think Cold War enemies would have jumped at the chance to discredit the US? You imagine literally tens of thousands of employees and associates can keep such a secret for 50 years? C'mon sundial.

I have no direct response to you, @enorbet. Good evening.

A much-loved President, who was martyred in 1963, made an extravagant promise. Certainly, a promise that his nation wanted to believe, and very much still does.

"We came in peace for all mankind!" Wow. And with a few months left to go. "Rest in Peace, President Kennedy!" Yeah. If only things were that easy. But for a few years after that, they were. Until they quietly dropped the program. It was very good while it lasted.

Human beings are like that, I suppose. And, can we really blame them? No one really wants to consider that we are, at least for the moment, still stuck(!) upon this planet ... No. We want to play golf.

"Tens of thousands of employees" have not wasted time on Apollo. They are right now busying themselves with the development of robotic probes which have, by the way, achieved rather astonishing successes. We now have photographs of Pluto. Where carbon-based humans cannot yet go, these teams have certainly achieved many mechanical successes that are certainly worthy of a trumpet. Our money has not been wasted.

Frankly, I am disappointed that what I consider "the Apollo hoax," has since politically(!) prevented us from pursuing "robotic lander missions" beginning upon the orbital body that is certainly most nearby to us. I feel that this is a tremendous waste of energy ... and money. Right now we should be sending dozens of robotic probes to learn more facts about this celestial body that is closest to us.

In the grand scheme of things, scientific advancement – "beam me up, Scotty!" – must not be held captive to 1969 political illusions. They made the decisions that they did at that time, and I respect them for that. But we must move forward, if we are ever to get off this planet. And the vanguards, at least for now, are going to be robots.

OK sundialsvcs, last attempt. All of the things you list are certainly within the realm of possibility but that's not how it played out. Hoaxes require a substantial amount of "hiding cards", of deception, often much out of sight. Apollo was public in a manner that few things are or can be because every location on our planet can see the moon and many nations had the technology to track progress. Some of those nations were isolated helpers like Canberra, Australia's radio telescope, while others were enemies, and one was an enemy in a race with us to get to the moon. Had their been one miniscule fault they would have leapt on it like rabid dogs AND they had 6 opportunities to do so.

Despite the existence of the means to debunk such a hoax on such a scale, in 50 years it has not happened and numerous corroborating events have. Consider the odds.

When we discuss the value and harm of Mythology I think it is important to consider scale and velocity. The manner in which Myths used to proliferate was slowly over a great deal of time. The effect of that scale and velocity is easy these days to see in how fundamental ancient mythologies evolved as they spread around the globe. They are commonly still identifiable as to the original source and message, but adapted to differing times and cultures.

Now, in the epoch of the Internet and smartphones, extremely rapid and often massive changes can occur, recently termed "Influencers". When we add click bait algorithms we get the "rabbit holes" most of us agree are problematic, powerfully affecting cultures by introducing and radicalizing concepts, increasing polarity and conflict, that produce disharmony AND the attempts to reduce disharmony by force, even violence.

There is actually a fairly long term trajectory of such influence that started in earnest, at least in the US but others adopting in turn, with Frederick Taylor .

If you prefer a wider overview or simply prefer videos to text, here is a very interesting one that will very likely stimulate both thought and emotion, and possibly, some compelling answers -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BD_Euf_CBbs