Henke 2022de

More on Hypothesis #3 of Henke (2022a; 2022b): Genesis 3 is Based on Misinterpretations of a Work of Fiction

Kevin R. Henke

September 15, 2022

In Henke (2022b), I quoted Henke (2022a) and stated:

“In Henke (2022a), I proposed four hypotheses to explain Genesis 3 with its Talking Snake story:

1. The Talking Snake existed and the account in Genesis 3 was accurately passed down by Adam to Moses. Moses then wrote it down in Genesis. There would have been no human eyewitnesses for most of the events in Genesis 1-2:14. If Genesis 1-2:14 is history, God would have to have given the information in these verses as visions.

2. Moses saw Genesis 1-3 and perhaps most or even all of everything else in Genesis through visions given by God. There didn’t need to be a continuous human transmission of information from Adam to Moses. Visions from God would not be open to errors unlike written or oral transmissions from Adam to Moses.

3. The Talking Snake of Genesis 3 was part of a made-up campfire story, a parable or based on a pagan myth that eventually was taken as fact by the ancient Israelites, like how President Reagan and his fans mistook fictional stories from World War 2 as real. William Tell (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/in-search-of-william-tell-2198511/ ) and a number of Roman Catholic saints (https://listverse.com/2014/05/17/10-beloved-saints-with-fictitious-biographies/ ) are probably also myths. Of course, in the United States, pro-abortionists regularly use fictional TV shows to convince Americans that abortion is a good thing. Even though they are fiction, many people believe the propaganda. Right now, a lot of Russians are believing the fictional propaganda their government is inventing about Ukraine. People also often pick and choose parts of fictional stories that they want to believe and ignore the rest, such as individuals believing in the existence of “The Force” from the Star Wars movies, while recognizing that the rest of the movies are fiction. A lot of people are gullible and believe fictions are real.

4. “Prophets” or others claimed to have visions from God about events that supposedly happened thousands of years earlier. These visions were delusions or outright lies, but a lot of people came to believe them. Joseph Smith also did this and Kat Kerr continues with this nonsense in the US.” [my emphasis]

Lundahl (2022m) then makes some general comments on Hypothesis #3 from the above bolded paragraph from Henke (2022b):

“Henke pretended I, by responding in more than one single page, in separately conceived and therefore separately presented essays, was dispersing the debate, here is a prime example of his doing so, by giving parallel examples as "proof" against my principle, and I am forced to discuss it - or leave the arguments unanswered. AND as at least two of the arguments are presented with links and each link provides arguments, that gives me more arguments to respond to than Henke is pretending to actually make.

As I explained in Henke (2022c), Mr. Lundahl’s essays in Lundahl (2022a-g) are terribly disorganized. The above quotation from Henke (2022b) is from Section 5.2 and Section 5 deals with the Talking Snake story. So, I have nothing out of place.

Furthermore, Mr. Lundahl clearly does not understand the scientific method and the important principle of the Method of Multiple Working Hypotheses (Strahler 1999, pp. 19-20), which was developed by T.C. Chamberlin around 1900. Henke (2022a) and Henke (2022b) provide four multiple working hypotheses on the origin of the Talking Snake story. They are not “proofs.” Mr. Lundahl is clearly chained to Hypothesis #1. This is his Ruling Hypothesis. In contrast, I recognize that either Hypothesis #3 or #4 are more likely than #1 or #2. This is the proper use of the Method of the Multiple Working Hypotheses, which states that at the end of a study, an investigator may be left with no, one, two, or even more plausible hypotheses. Further investigations may then be required to discover additional hypotheses and eliminate old ones. In contrast, Mr. Lundahl picks a hypothesis that he thinks best supports his Biblical dogma (for some reason Hypothesis #1 and not #2) and then he comes up with any irrational argument to defend it.

It’s always a good idea to use clear and well-organized references to back up and expand upon on one’s arguments. As can be seen in any peer-reviewed journal, it’s not necessary for an author to summarize every reference that he/she cites. If readers want to investigate the topic in greater detail, they can read those references for themselves. In contrast, Lundahl (2022i) has total contempt for proper referencing and bibliographies. He doesn’t even realize that his shunning of peer-reviewed and other reliable references severely weakens his presentations.

Lundahl (2022m) continues:

“This is partly literally failing to account for my already dealing with the difference I made between believing an event as historic and believing a principle enunced in a work of fiction, which is something the author could believe about the real world as well as illustrate in his fiction, and could be right to believe about the real world. In his fiction about Father Brown, Chesterton enounced as a principle anti-Catholics are often ill informed - I believe Chesterton believed this about the real world, and Kevin R. Henke illustrates the point. There is a connexion between Father Brown and the Force : Sir Alec Guiness (RIP). Before he played Obi Wan Kenobi in the earliest published Star Wars film, and two more, he had played Father Brown. As he walked back to his hotel, not changing, a boy taking him for a priest, asked him to walk him home and simply took his hand with total confidence. Certain abuses would have been very rare back then, and unknown or virtually so, in Normandy, where this happened (a Catholic in Paris is to one in Normandy, as a Protestant in NYC to one in the Bible belt). He started to look things up and converted.” [my emphasis]

Okay. So, why wouldn’t both Mr. Lundahl and I agree with the following sentence that I said about Hypothesis #3 in the above section from Henke (2022b)?

“People also often pick and choose parts of fictional stories that they want to believe and ignore the rest, such as individuals believing in the existence of “The Force” from the Star Wars movies, while recognizing that the rest of the movies are fiction.”

I admit that I’m no expert on Catholicism, but more importantly, Mr. Lundahl is no expert on the scientific method, logic and how to investigate the past, which are critical requirements in this debate.

Reference:

Strahler, A.N. 1999. Science and Earth History: The Evolution/Creation Controversy: 2^nd ed., Prometheus Books: Amherst, NY, USA, 552 pp.