Is there a God, and if so, who is it?

[ABSTRUSE]

p.s. for Russians it's Bog. or Gob? Ha ha ha.

Perdita

You've been by yourself too much today sweets, I think yer losin it...lol

~A~

ps..if Ogg is God, what does that make his hat????

 

[PDumbledore]

WOW!!!!

WOW. After reading the last few posts, my head is just a spinning.

There are too many unexplained things in this world for a person not to believe in a higher power. Whether the name of this higher power is God, Yahweh, Allah, or whom ever, it is hard to not to believe. Do I believe? Yes, but in my own way.

For those who say that they need to see hard proof before believing, read about the Dead Sea Scrolls, and The Rosetta Stone.

 

[snooper]

No.

No, there is no God.

The concept of invisible power(s) controlling natural events, but susceptible to the entreaties of a chosen priesthood, was invented by a clever con artist to justify the rest of his tribe keeping him in food and drink and clothes and comfort without him having to do all the annoying things like hunting, gathering, etc.

Since then there has always been a priesthood battening on the more gullible (and hence poorest) members of society instead of getting a proper job.

Incidentally, each of these "holy" men thinks that he and his friends are the only ones who know "the truth" and so they foment all kinds of trouble (up to and including many wars) in their attempts to suppress their rivals in the hunt for lay people's money.

There is no life after death; when swe die the brain ceases to function and so the mind ceases to exist. The best analogy is the extinguishing of the flame on a candle; the flame doesn't continue to exist on some "other level".

Edited to add Of course I will be vilified for exposing the trick. Those who profit by it will object because they stand to lose, and those who pay them regularly will object because they don't want to be shown up for the fools they are.

 

[mismused]

At the risk of not being read:

Life is more than fascinating, and most likely more than we'll ever know in this experience we normally call life.

Normally because from all I've read, no one knows what the mind is, nor where consciousness springs from.

Now I've read that protons (the goodies we're all made from, albeit, a particular variety, I think), are "older" than the universe.

Fifty five and Charlie seem to have a lot of knowledge on much of this. I wish I could say as snooper does that there is no God, but I just don't know. I do wonder about it greatly, though. It's very fascinating, but often leaves me very befuddled. Still, I do think science will help us a lot. That proton thingy leaves me with chills (as do other things they've uncovered).

m

 

[dirtylover]

Re: At the risk of not being read:

Now I've read that protons (the goodies we're all made from, albeit, a particular variety, I think), are "older" than the universe.

I've not come across this idea, but it sounds pretty interesting. However, if we take the three predominant theories of how the universe began, it seems a bit unlikely:

1. Big Bang - details are controversial, but generally accepted that this was beginning of everything, including time, space and matter. According to Stephen Hawking, this negates the possibility of there being a God.

2. Steady State theory (i.e. all is as was and always will be) - impossible for anything to predate anything else, since it's all been around forever. This isn't a popular theory cos all the evidence points to there having been a big bang (15billion y.a.)

3. Creationism - not relevant to protons really, unless we suppose God was made of 'em.

Also, the idea of their being matter before the universe runs into trouble semantically, since, by definition, the universe encompasses all matter. However, if there's something I'm missing, I'd like to hear more...

 

[dirtylover]

Re: No.

Incidentally, each of these "holy" men thinks that he and his friends are the only ones who know "the truth" and so they foment all kinds of trouble (up to and including many wars) in their attempts to suppress their rivals in the hunt for lay people's money.

There is no life after death; when swe die the brain ceases to function and so the mind ceases to exist. The best analogy is the extinguishing of the flame on a candle; the flame doesn't continue to exist on some "other level".

Edited to add Of course I will be vilified for exposing the trick. Those who profit by it will object because they stand to lose, and those who pay them regularly will object because they don't want to be shown up for the fools they are.

'Everyday I thank the lord I'm welsh' -Tom Jones (and he seemed to do alright for himself )

Agreed, religion has always been used as a vector to enforce 'extra beliefs'. IMO, all religions tend to get far too embellished with meaningless trivialities; but at their core, they scratch at a common surface...

e.g. budha told people to follow their own path, but instead they treated him as their leader - comes back to human nature

 

[dirtylover]

ps..if Ogg is God, what does that make his hat???? [/B]

And who is Jean d'Artois?

 

[mismused]

Re: Re: At the risk of not being read:

I've not come across this idea, but it sounds pretty interesting. However, if we take the three predominant theories of how the universe began, it seems a bit unlikely:

1. Big Bang - details are controversial, but generally accepted that this was beginning of everything, including time, space and matter. According to Stephen Hawking, this negates the possibility of there being a God.

2. Steady State theory (i.e. all is as was and always will be) - impossible for anything to predate anything else, since it's all been around forever. This isn't a popular theory cos all the evidence points to there having been a big bang (15billion y.a.)

3. Creationism - not relevant to protons really, unless we suppose God was made of 'em.

Also, the idea of their being matter before the universe runs into trouble semantically, since, by definition, the universe encompasses all matter. However, if there's something I'm missing, I'd like to hear more...

==========================

dl,

Actually, it gets worse, or better, and for me, much more fascinating. Supposedly, all matter is made up of quarks, so if protons are older than the universe, how old are quarks.

That protons are older than the universe was supposed to be proven by Maurice Goldhaber who was the director of Brookhaven Nat'l Lab. The best part, if you can fathom it (I can't, not that comfortable with math), is that the only thing he used was our bodies. He did this, in part, if not totally, I guess, in 1954.

It's fascinating, just as quantum mechanics. I think Charlie mentioned that. Not sure about Fifty five.

I don't subscribe to any religion, but have been amazed at Buddhism (see quiet poly, the poetess for some on this -- Buddhism -- that is).

m

 

[Guest]

And who is Jean d'Artois?

Og's alter ego/non-de-plume.

Lou

 

[dirtylover]

Re: Re: Re: At the risk of not being read:

==========================
That protons are older than the universe was supposed to be proven by Maurice Goldhaber who was the director of Brookhaven Nat'l Lab. The best part, if you can fathom it (I can't, not that comfortable with math), is that the only thing he used was our bodies. He did this, in part, if not totally, I guess, in 1954.

cool - I'll look into it, although physics tends to leave me cross-eyed after a while

 

[sweetnpetite]

Re: No.

There is no life after death; when swe die the brain ceases to function and so the mind ceases to exist. The best analogy is the extinguishing of the flame on a candle; the flame doesn't continue to exist on some "other level".

It becomes smoke, and it disperses into the air. Eventually it comes back down in the water, which seeps through the ground and ends up one way or another in our bodies and eventually being eliminated and going back through the prosess. That is why we have 'acid rain'- because when we burn fosil fules (or anything else)- they do *not* seace to exist, they become a gaseous form and enter into the environment. If you've ever lived near a factory, you'd know that burning something doesn't make it cease to exist- in fact it makes it ever more present. Rather than being nowhere, it trutly is everywhere (much to our great distain)

 

[snooper]

Re: Re: No.

It becomes smoke, and it disperses into the air. ...

I understand that the candle and the atoms in it do not cease to exist. What ceases to exist is the flame. It is a particular state of some of the molecules in the candle and that state ceases to exist as the molecules stop burning. Likewise the mind is a particular state of the components of the brain. As those components cease to operate, that state no longer exists.

 

[mismused]

Re: Re: Re: No.

I understand that the candle and the atoms in it do not cease to exist. What ceases to exist is the flame. It is a particular state of some of the molecules in the candle and that state ceases to exist as the molecules stop burning. Likewise the mind is a particular state of the components of the brain. As those components cease to operate, that state no longer exists.

==========================

snooper,

A silly thought I had last night might be worth considering here, ref: mind, brain, ceasing to exist. It revolves around the idea of a connectedness of happenings, as if possibly thoughts (perhaps "God"-like?).

Assuming that the atoms do not cease to exist (the neutron living in "captivity" thus not dying/decaying as it does when out of the neucleus), and assuming that the atom lives a very, very long time, and perhaps beyond (proton life cycle, force holding it and neutron together) .

Still, it is uniformly (I am told/read) accepted that it is quarks that are the building blocks of all matter (at least until they discover something else, bless them all ).

Here's the connectedness (BTW, it's via "communication"):

How do the quarks know how to make what atoms? There are so many types of atoms.

How did the matter (atoms) learn how to differentiate themselves, or why (if they knew) (it takes a particular type of very special connection of matter to make carbon atoms that we're made of)?

How do the photons (in the CERN experiments) "know" instantly when their partner is turning though separated.

How does an zygote, when it begins spiltting up to make the various cells, know which of the cells will make a liver, which a kidney, etc.?

Lastly, how does a child learn to speak? There is no way that we teach a child to speak; they do so on their own. They break the code of whatever language is being spoken, and the next thing one knows, they're talking to us.

In all of these cases, there is a language involved (perhaps, if you follow my meaning).

"Who" taught that "language" to all of them?

If you see the "connectedness" that I'm talking about, then that has to be from what we commonly think of as "mind," or consciousness of some kind. Is that possibly true? Myself, I don't know, but they are curiosities.

Again, I don't subscribe to any religion, but do wonder a lot, kind of like I do about why we're so wired to desire pleasure, and for what other purpose than that which we suppose (if there is another reason for it, that is).

m

 

[mismused]

Another thought

Since my post hasn?t been commented on, yet read a bit, I wonder if some might be interested in just a bit more on this questioning deal.

I mentioned in my earlier post about experiments at CERN (European Lab For Particle Physics), perhaps a bit more is in order now.

An Irish physicist, John Bell, came up with what has become known as Bell?s Theorem which talks about two sort of brother/sister photons being split up as in an electron being whacked and becoming a couple of photons. If the two related photons travel in different directions, he stated that when the one did something, the other knew it. Photons are light particles, massless, and travel at the speed of light (186,000 mph, or something fantastic like that).

It was tested in ?82, and the ?instantaneous knowledge? was verified. CERN tested it again in ?98, and over many different distances. Each time it was the same. They call it ?nonseparability.?

They figure it is the same with all particles, though photons are massless (as are gravitons, neutrinos, and perhaps one other that is known).

What is of interest here is the ?communication,? or ?inseparability.

If we die, and all that we are disappears, save the atoms we cannot see, what are we? Are we dead? Or, perhaps, are we just illusions that were allowed to ?dream? as might have been alluded to by Charley H?

We cannot be without the atoms/protons that continue to live, yet are we protons?

And what of those massless photons? Do thoughts have mass? Can any find any mass in consciousness, thoughts, or even mind?

All that we are seems to be due to certain ?accidents? of nature, of the universe. Is there a God, and if so, what is God? What are we?

Happy reading.

m

 

[snooper]

Re: Re: Re: Re: No.

Pardon my adding your two postings together. I hadn't logged on since before the first one.

A silly thought I had last night might be worth considering here, ref: mind, brain, ceasing to exist. It revolves around the idea of a connectedness of happenings, as if possibly thoughts (perhaps "God"-like?).

Assuming that the atoms do not cease to exist (the neutron living in "captivity" thus not dying/decaying as it does when out of the neucleus), and assuming that the atom lives a very, very long time, and perhaps beyond (proton life cycle, force holding it and neutron together) .

Still, it is uniformly (I am told/read) accepted that it is quarks that are the building blocks of all matter (at least until they discover something else, bless them all ).

Here's the connectedness (BTW, it's via "communication"):

How do the quarks know how to make what atoms? There are so many types of atoms.

How did the matter (atoms) learn how to differentiate themselves, or why (if they knew) (it takes a particular type of very special connection of matter to make carbon atoms that we're made of)?

Neither the atoms, nor the quarks know anything. The anthropomorphising of physics and "Nature" leads to many fallacies, not least the concept that atoms "know" how to build molecules.

How does an zygote, when it begins spiltting up to make the various cells, know which of the cells will make a liver, which a kidney, etc.?

Ditto. The stem cells don't make any conscious decisions. They are pre-programmed (if you must) to form a certain number of different cells, and these cells are also programmed to put themselves in the right places. The "programme" is the genome.

Lastly, how does a child learn to speak? There is no way that we teach a child to speak; they do so on their own. They break the code of whatever language is being spoken, and the next thing one knows, they're talking to us.

This is a predisposition of the brain to interpret input as meaningful language and then to "crack the code". Children learn by imitating the world around them and discovering that certain sounds produce certain results. Crudely, they learn that saying "Hungry" produces food, etc. As to how they know how to do it, that is about as meaningful a question as asking how an abacus knows how to count.

In all of these cases, there is a language involved (perhaps, if you follow my meaning).

"Who" taught that "language" to all of them?

If you see the "connectedness" that I'm talking about, then that has to be from what we commonly think of as "mind," or consciousness of some kind. Is that possibly true? Myself, I don't know, but they are curiosities.

No, there is not a "language" involved in any meaningful sense of the word language.

An Irish physicist, John Bell, came up with what has become known as Bell?s Theorem which talks about two sort of brother/sister photons being split up as in an electron being whacked and becoming a couple of photons. If the two related photons travel in different directions, he stated that when the one did something, the other knew it. Photons are light particles, massless, and travel at the speed of light (186,000 mph, or something fantastic like that).

It was tested in ?82, and the ?instantaneous knowledge? was verified. CERN tested it again in ?98, and over many different distances. Each time it was the same. They call it ?nonseparability.?

They figure it is the same with all particles, though photons are massless (as are gravitons, neutrinos, and perhaps one other that is known).

Nonseparability of objects which are sometimes particles and sometimes waves and have no mass, and therefore no substance, is a useful concept in explaining certain phenomena, but it is doubtful if it has any "real world" validity in a measurable sense. An analogy is the square root of minus one, symbolised as i, which is useful to engineers in certain calculations about electrical circuits, but which doesn't exist in the "real" world, and is formally known as an imaginary number.

If we die, and all that we are disappears, save the atoms we cannot see, what are we? Are we dead? Or, perhaps, are we just illusions that were allowed to ?dream? as might have been alluded to by Charley H?

We cannot be without the atoms/protons that continue to live, yet are we protons?

And what of those massless photons? Do thoughts have mass? Can any find any mass in consciousness, thoughts, or even mind?

All that we are seems to be due to certain ?accidents? of nature, of the universe. Is there a God, and if so, what is God? What are we?

We can see the atoms, or at any rate the molecules which make up the body. The body does not disappear, only the functioning fails.

 

[upfront]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: No.

An analogy is the square root of minus one, symbolised as i, which is useful to engineers in certain calculations about electrical circuits, but which doesn't exist in the "real" world, and is formally known as an imaginary number.

Can I be bothered to point out that "imaginary" numbers certainly do exist in the real world? I suppose I can. The nomenclature should not mislead us; these numbers are no more "imaginary" than numbers that can't be expressed as a fraction are "irrational". Complex numbers have all sorts of fascinating properties, and the study of functions of a complex variable – complex analysis – has enormous practical use in applied mathematics.

 

[snooper]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: No.

Can I be bothered to point out that "imaginary" numbers certainly do exist in the real world? I suppose I can. The nomenclature should not mislead us; these numbers are no more "imaginary" than numbers that can't be expressed as a fraction are "irrational". Complex numbers have all sorts of fascinating properties, and the study of functions of a complex variable – complex analysis – has enormous practical use in applied mathematics.

The concept of i is very useful, as I said, but it does not exist in our real, three dimensional world. If I go down from where I sit 1 mile I am in an old coal mine, if I go up I am avoiding aircraft from the local airfield, if I go left I am on a mountain, and if I go right I am in the river. If I go i miles in any direction, where am I?
That is the sense in which i does not exist, and in that sense the mind does not exist either, only the brain which the mind "inhabits" exists.
Abstract concepts are just that, abstract, but it doesn't make them less useful.

 

[upfront]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: No.

The concept of i is very useful, as I said, but it does not exist in our real, three dimensional world. If I go down from where I sit 1 mile I am in an old coal mine, if I go up I am avoiding aircraft from the local airfield, if I go left I am on a mountain, and if I go right I am in the river. If I go i miles in any direction, where am I?
That is the sense in which i does not exist, and in that sense the mind does not exist either, only the brain which the mind "inhabits" exists.
Abstract concepts are just that, abstract, but it doesn't make them less useful.

It depends on how you define "exist". (Walking i miles in any direction is analogous to throwing e stones into a lake.)

 

[cloudy]

This has gone from "Is there a God?" to a discussion of physics, which I'll admit, I failed in college.

We can discuss the minutae to death, and claim that by knowing how these things work, there is no creator. I don't buy it.

There was a discussion earlier about energy, and that energy goes somewhere.

If we look at our thoughts as energy, which reduced to their basic form they are, what prevents the leap to thinking of our soul (for lack of a better word) as a form of energy?

Just for the sake of argument, and I do believe in a creator, what would happen to our souls after the body dies? If it is energy, then it still exists, yes?

Where does it go?

I know my thoughts on this, and I'm not trying to convince anyone else. Your beliefs, or lack thereof, aren't my concern. I'm just curious.

 

[mismused]

This has gone from "Is there a God?" to a discussion of physics, which I'll admit, I failed in college.

We can discuss the minutae to death, and claim that by knowing how these things work, there is no creator. I don't buy it.

There was a discussion earlier about energy, and that energy goes somewhere.

If we look at our thoughts as energy, which reduced to their basic form they are, what prevents the leap to thinking of our soul (for lack of a better word) as a form of energy?

Just for the sake of argument, and I do believe in a creator, what would happen to our souls after the body dies? If it is energy, then it still exists, yes?

Where does it go?

I know my thoughts on this, and I'm not trying to convince anyone else. Your beliefs, or lack thereof, aren't my concern. I'm just curious.

==========================

cloudy,

Basically, I agree with you. There is "something" that is God, or God equivalent out there, I just don't know what it is.

All I'm I have been saying is that there are too (excessive) many anomolies for there not to have been something.

Any of these anomolies being absent, so would we (be absent, or would never have been as we are now).

To discuss each point unto exhaustion is not where I was going, but taking them all as a whole for the purposes of wondering just what may, or may not be God, and possibly purpose, was what I was going after.

I certainly don't remember creating myself, but we are complex, and we do have the "universe" in us. It is a marvel to wonder about, especially (at least to me) all that science has shown us about the many questions that are out there, and very much in us.

Like as not, we do have the micro world in us, and with it, the quantumness of it.

It's all a matter of wonder to me, not for the sake of nit picking it apart item by item, or arguement. We are made to wonder.

peace,

m

 

[cloudy]

==========================

cloudy,

Basically, I agree with you. There is "something" that is God, or God equivalent out there, I just don't know what it is.

All I'm I have been saying is that there are too (excessive) many anomolies for there not to have been something.

Any of these anomolies being absent, so would we (be absent, or would never have been as we are now).

To discuss each point unto exhaustion is not where I was going, but taking them all as a whole for the purposes of wondering just what may, or may not be God, and possibly purpose, was what I was going after.

I certainly don't remember creating myself, but we are complex, and we do have the "universe" in us. It is a marvel to wonder about, especially (at least to me) all that science has shown us about the many questions that are out there, and very much in us.

Like as not, we do have the micro world in us, and with it, the quantumness of it.

It's all a matter of wonder to me, not for the sake of nit picking it apart item by item, or arguement. We are made to wonder.

peace,

m

Nicely put. Way too many "coincidences" for there not to be something behind it all, I agree.

Wonder is a good thing. Too many people lose their sense of wonder as they grow older, and become jaded. I lost it myself for awhile, and thankfully, have regained it.

 

[mismused]

Nicely put. Way too many "coincidences" for there not to be something behind it all, I agree.

Wonder is a good thing. Too many people lose their sense of wonder as they grow older, and become jaded. I lost it myself for awhile, and thankfully, have regained it.

============================

cloudy,

Perhaps you will allow yourself to look into physics again. One need not do it to be a professor, but simply to wonder at the wonders being uncovered by those who do delve deeply. There are many beautiful mysteries out there, none more mysterious than our own being, our humanness.

m

 

[cloudy]

============================

cloudy,

Perhaps you will allow yourself to look into physics again. One need not do it to be a professor, but simply to wonder at the wonders being uncovered by those who do delve deeply. There are many beautiful mysteries out there, none more mysterious than our own being, our humanness.

m

It is interesting, however, I have adult ADD, and focusing for the length of time it would require for me to even partially understand it is almost impossible for me. I do much better in short bursts.

I know the basics.....with an electrical engineer for a dad (he held a masters in math from MIT), and two brothers who were also e.e.'s, I could hardly not know the basics.

The college I went to is known as an engineering school. 4th in the nation when I was there, and physics was generally known as a "weeder" class. One of those made harder than necessary. When I took it they had to grade on the curve just to pass anyone. I think a passing grade was somewhere around 20%. Mine wasn't near that high.

 

[snooper]

... All I'm I have been saying is that there are too (excessive) many anomolies for there not to have been something.

Any of these anomolies being absent, so would we (be absent, or would never have been as we are now)...

This is a very basic fallacy known as "arguing from the particular to the general".

If we knew there were a lot of other worlds with life on them,
AND
If we knew that the creation of life was extremely difficult,
THEN
These arguments might be tenable.

There are two possibilities: we are unique, or we are not.
If we are unique and if the probability of the random creation of life on a planet is very low (we know it isn't zero) then we may be the only life in the entire universe. In which case we would be the only ones wondering how such a rare occurence could happen, and the real answer to that is that the universe is big, with lots of stars, and whatever conditions are necessary to do anything will probably occur sooner or later.

If we are not unique then there are two possibilities: we occurred naturally, or some creator intervened.
The first means that the creation of life is not as rare as we thought, or the universe is bigger than we thought, or life occurred once and seeded the rest of the universe.
The second raises the question of how the creator came into existence. If the creator is eternal and uncreated then how is it that you assume that we need to have been created voluntarily?

For an interesting theory, based on the Judao-Christian God, I refer you to the theology of plastics as expounded in "Blue Bone" by somebody Martin. (I'll edit this to correct that when I find my copy.)
Edited to correct author's name The author of "Blue Bone" is Martin Woodhouse.

 

[mismused]

This is a very basic fallacy known as "arguing from the particular to the general".

===========================

(I'm not arguing the particular anything, rather a series of particulars to be taken together, not sliced and diced on their own, not a thought separated into its constituent words.

Stay with this idea, and we're on the same wavelength as far as a discussion goes. The point being made is a perspective of "many things" together, kind of like the making of an atom -- many parts, and some major circumstances -- thus: atom!

There is "something" out there, and as I said, I have no idea what. God? God-like? Intelligent force? Call it what you will, but the discussion is in seeing somethings (plural) that when taken together form an opinion.)

=========================

If we knew there were a lot of other worlds with life on them,

(I have no idea if there are other worlds with life on them, but there are, apparently, in the "visible" universe, over 400 billion galaxies, with over 400 billion stars each. What the possibilities are isn't yet completely defined. We have recently found a planet that is said to possibly be similar to ours in this past year.)

(None of this was not a part of the basic thought/premise that I laid out.)

AND
If we knew that the creation of life was extremely difficult,

(Oh, very difficult, but not for someone, or something -- taken from the cosmic view of time, that is. LOL)

THEN
These arguments might be tenable.

(I'm not arguing anything, simply saying that there are very suspicious anomolies that point to some really, really cool basic planning without which even the universe itself could not be).

There are two possibilities: we are unique, or we are not.

(I'm uinique, yet not. You're unique, yet not. Never mind, this can go anywhere.)


If we are unique and if the probability of the random creation of life on a planet is very low (we know it isn't zero) then we may be the only life in the entire universe. In which case we would be the only ones wondering how such a rare occurence could happen, and the real answer to that is that the universe is big, with lots of stars, and whatever conditions are necessary to do anything will probably occur sooner or later.

(Random? After all it took to get us here, random? No way! Again, like the "unique" thing, this "sooner or later" thingy can go anywhere. There are specific things that have had to occur to get us here as <I>we are</I>. Whether there's "any other" "are"'s out there, I have no idea for they may, if they are, be beyond our present ken.)

========================

If we are not unique then there are two possibilities: we occurred naturally,

(but only after so much had taken place that was "unique to our existence.)

or some creator intervened.

(Or not! Perhaps intervention wasn't necessary since the "plan" may have been already laid out, so to speak. Just wondering, just wondering.)

The first means that the creation of life is not as rare as we thought, or the universe is bigger than we thought, or life occurred once and seeded the rest of the universe.

==========================
The second raises the question of how the creator came into existence. If the creator is eternal and uncreated then how is it that you assume that we need to have been created voluntarily?


(This second is a question that I won't delve into here for I don't have any idea about this: Imutability. It is an interesting question, and one which the Buddhists have worked on quite nicely [sorry to seem to try to trump your "Blue Bone" theory]. The Buddhists I'm talking about are not the "airport" variety.)

For an interesting theory, based on the Judao-Christian God, I refer you to the theology of plastics as expounded in "Blue Bone" by somebody Martin. (I'll edit this to correct that when I find my copy.)
Edited to correct author's name The author of "Blue Bone" is Martin Woodhouse.

(See it as a question of the "many" coincidences" that have led me to wonderment, and we have a possible discussion. Other than that, I can't/won't "argue" your "particular"(s).)

(What I do is read, think, and wonder where it can lead. This started as a what if from the scenario of things taken together. Together, along with many other things, too.)

mismused