I think if you ask my wife, she would give a less than flattering answer as to the location of my ruling facility.

(More serious answer later. Going to see Antman.)

(August 29, 2015 at 6:33 pm)Randy Carson Wrote: Could you expand on this, Nestor?

How is the idea that the term "heart", a metaphor or idiom for that innermost place within man, problematic?

What are we really saying when we say that an athlete has "heart" or that we know something to be true in our "heart of hearts".

It's quite simple Randy. The idiom derives from an era when our most thoughtful predecessors actually believed they were thinking, deciding, feeling, etc., with their heart.. They were wrong but the notion has retained its common, albeit incorrect, usage.

(August 29, 2015 at 6:33 pm)Randy Carson Wrote:

(August 29, 2015 at 6:11 pm)Nestor Wrote: ^Exactly, Pyrrho.

I had to do a double take when Randy suggested that, according to Catholic doctrine, God was simply speaking in idioms - when people actually believed the literal truth of its content, and - at least to some extent - couldn't have been expected to know otherwise.

Could you expand on this, Nestor?

How is the idea that the term "heart", a metaphor or idiom for that innermost place within man, problematic?

What are we really saying when we say that an athlete has "heart" or that we know something to be true in our "heart of hearts".

You can trust your gut because your gut actually has brain cells in it.  But your heart, on the other hand, is simply a bunch of hollow muscles deigned to pump blood throughout your body.  It completely lacks brain cells and therefore it can't think.  

Just think about all of the people who have had heart transplants.  According to your line of reasoning they would be thinking thoughts that came from the donor.

(August 29, 2015 at 9:15 pm)Nestor Wrote:

(August 29, 2015 at 6:33 pm)Randy Carson Wrote: Could you expand on this, Nestor?

How is the idea that the term "heart", a metaphor or idiom for that innermost place within man, problematic?

What are we really saying when we say that an athlete has "heart" or that we know something to be true in our "heart of hearts".

It's quite simple Randy. The idiom derives from an era when our most thoughtful predecessors actually believed they were thinking, deciding, feeling, etc., with their heart.. They were wrong but the notion has retained its common, albeit incorrect, usage.

Yes. It is like we now metaphorically say that the sun rises and sets (well, those of us who do not have a pre-Copernican view of the solar system mean them as metaphors).  The ancients, though, were not being metaphorical when they said those things.

The reason we use those as metaphors is because many ancients got it wrong.  Just like the heart example.  There are likely many other such ways of speaking based on ancient error, that are now merely metaphors when they were originally meant literally.

(August 29, 2015 at 9:15 pm)Nestor Wrote:

(August 29, 2015 at 6:33 pm)Randy Carson Wrote: Could you expand on this, Nestor?

How is the idea that the term "heart", a metaphor or idiom for that innermost place within man, problematic?

What are we really saying when we say that an athlete has "heart" or that we know something to be true in our "heart of hearts".

It's quite simple Randy. The idiom derives from an era when our most thoughtful predecessors actually believed they were thinking, deciding, feeling, etc., with their heart.. They were wrong but the notion has retained its common, albeit incorrect, usage.

Okay, but how does this reflect poorly upon God, the scriptures or believers?

If you ever tell a girl you love her with all your heart, will she be offended or unimpressed because she knows the organ pumping your blood has nothing to do with your feelings for her?

Or would she be happy because just as we speak of the "heart of the earth" alluding to its depths, so you will be taken to mean that your love for her is deep?

I'm not really looking for more conflict...I have enough in this forum already. But it just seems like much ado about nothing.

(August 29, 2015 at 11:54 pm)Randy Carson Wrote: Okay, but how does this reflect poorly upon God, the scriptures or believers?

If you ever tell a girl you love her with all your heart, will she be offended or unimpressed because she knows the organ pumping your blood has nothing to do with your feelings for her?

Or would she be happy because just as we speak of the "heart of the earth" alluding to its depths, so you will be taken to mean that your love for her is deep?

I'm not really looking for more conflict...I have enough in this forum already. But it just seems like much ado about nothing.

It reflects the ignorance of the authorship, is all, and I wouldn't willingly mislead a girl who thought her heart was the domain of the mind by affirming her misunderstanding, as you're trying to persuade me that your God would.

(August 30, 2015 at 12:02 am)Nestor Wrote:

(August 29, 2015 at 11:54 pm)Randy Carson Wrote: Okay, but how does this reflect poorly upon God, the scriptures or believers?

If you ever tell a girl you love her with all your heart, will she be offended or unimpressed because she knows the organ pumping your blood has nothing to do with your feelings for her?

Or would she be happy because just as we speak of the "heart of the earth" alluding to its depths, so you will be taken to mean that your love for her is deep?

I'm not really looking for more conflict...I have enough in this forum already. But it just seems like much ado about nothing.

It reflects the ignorance of the authorship, is all, and I wouldn't willingly mislead a girl who thought her heart was the domain of the mind by affirming her misunderstanding, as you're trying to persuade me that your God would.

Oh.

Well, there are lots of things that the ancient writers did not understand about anatomy and psychology, etc. at the time. However, I'm not sure how the use of the term "heart" to describe the depths of one's being is either an error or of any great consequence. The second definition of the word seems to justify its use.

But if you feel better getting this off your chest, go for it.

(See what I did there? )

(August 30, 2015 at 12:18 am)Randy Carson Wrote: Well, there are lots of things that the ancient writers did not understand about

That seems to be usual apologist argument. Clearly, ancient writers were not divinely inspired by any holy being so much as they were merely inspired by their imaginations to create something they hoped would shape the world through their misguided views.

This takes me back several decades to college.  Descartes (yes the Rene Descartes of I think therefore I am) thought the seat of decision and of the soul resided in the Pineal gland because according to his view this is where the brain met the animal spirits of the blood. 

Quote:Thus, when the soul wants to remember something, this volition makes the gland lean first to one side and then to another, thus driving the spirits towards different regions of the brain until they come upon the one containing traces left by the object we want to remember. These traces consist simply in the fact that the pores of the brain through which the spirits previously made their way owing to the presence of this object have thereby become more apt than the others to be opened in the same way when the spirits again flow towards them. And so the spirits enter into these pores more easily when they come upon them, thereby producing in the gland that special movement which represents the same object to the soul, and makes it recognize the object as the one it wanted to remember” (AT XI:360, CSM I:343).

The description of the effect of the soul on the body in the causation of bodily movement is also more detailed: “And the activity of the soul consists entirely in the fact that simply by willing something it brings it about that the little gland to which it is closely joined moves in the manner required to produce the effect corresponding to this volition” (AT XI:359, CSM I:343).

Rene Descartes, Treatise of Manhttp://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pineal-gland/

It was essentially an argument from ignorance. We don't know what the Pineal gland does. It's located in the brain---therefore it must be the soul.

Yeah, you guys covered my thoughts on this already